


For San Lorenzo

by riva1argentica



Category: The Adventures of Puss in Boots (Cartoon)
Genre: Angst, Drama, Ensemble Cast, Everything is Beautiful and Everything Hurts, Evil Puss is a Deranged Control Freak, F/M, Fix-It, Gen, Magic, Mental Coercion, Mind Control, Post-Season 5, Puss Has Issues, Romance, Sweet Ginger, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-02-11
Updated: 2019-02-03
Packaged: 2019-03-16 16:32:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 15
Words: 103,450
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13640085
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/riva1argentica/pseuds/riva1argentica
Summary: Behold San Lorenzo, forced to its knees. Following the dethronement of the Blind King, our heroes' triumph in the Netherworld is swiftly crushed underboot by yet another plight, and Puss and Dulcinea must first set their emotions aside to save San Lorenzo from an impending hail of fire and brimstone before all descends to chaos.





	1. Prologue: A Dream

**Author's Note:**

> Skip the A/N, I just need to get some feels out. 
> 
> Hey guys! If someone’s actually reading, send me a little sign. Like, hello? Am I the only one who loves Puss and Dulcinea together, or, what? Because apparently this fandom is too silent, receives too little love, has too few to zero fics. They don’t deserve this. AT ALL. T.T
> 
> Okay, so guys. I need an explanation. Why is it that there are few to almost no fanfics in the Adventures of Puss in Boots when I’m so HYPED UP all about it? Or is there something wrong with me? I feel so alone. The fandom is so barren. After all, I’m supposed to be 17 frickin years old. Even I weird myself out sometimes. 
> 
> This is the product of all my speculation during the CRUEL CLIFFHANGER they gave us on the last episode of season 5. My mind went on overdrive and I was sure I was nuts but I can’t write this for the heck of me until the urge to write it came back after I watched the season finale because THAT FINALE IS TRIGGERING MY ANGSTINESS AND I CAN’T HOLD THIS ANNOYING LITTLE IDEA IN MY HANDS ANYMORE it BURNS already. T.T 
> 
> So, this was written because of the nuisance that is season 5, and the shattered feels that is season 6. Rated T because of a psycho character and darkish scenes that they’d never have been allowed to write for a children’s show. Contains angst and drama that is uncharacteristic of the show, so, be warned.

A rose.

She was clutching a rose. So tightly, helplessly, desperately; it was her lifeline, and letting go would mean _letting him go_. The proof of pain, the pain of the thorns digging into her fur and further into her skin, it soothed her; and the blood drawn from the wounds wrote memories into her heart, fuelling each thump with emotion, strong and impassioned and magical—

But frustratingly indecipherable.

For they were written far too deeply into the folds of her heart that the mind can never be able to grasp it, far as its searching roots may try to reach. But then, good, _good_ , she thought, she panted, she _screamed_ inside her mind with all the force her throat couldn’t muster, clutching the rose even tighter, tighter, afraid that the slightest loosening of her fingers would send her falling back down into that deep dark hole she’d already managed so far to climb from. _Good_ , she thought, drawing even more pain and relishing in it, _good_ , because the pain, it was—

It was proof. Proof that all of this is real, and I have hope, I will _see him again_ and he will _not disappear_ like he did the last time, and the time before that, and before that, and—and I will finally, _finally get to ask_ —

She stumbled over a rock, but unlike the thousands of times before when she had managed to catch herself from falling, this time, this time was different.

She hit the ground head first into the dirt.

The silence stretched into minutes, filled by her restless panting, her convulsive, tearless sobs; and were the forest alive, were the moon there to give her light, wolves and bears and night owls would have gathered round, staring at the single patch of white in a world smeared by the colours of death and decay. But alas, she was alone, with nothing but the skeletons of centuries-old trees long dead for company. She was cold, with nothing but the deathly whispers of the winter fog to blanket her. Each exhaled cloud of breath shivered, but not because of the cold—it was because of the pain. Her throat was parched and ripped and possibly wounded, and she’d had to stop from the physical screaming three nights ago. She was tired from searching and running for hours on end, and try as she might, she can’t help but think that maybe…

Maybe it was time to give up. Maybe trying hard would be _pointless_ —

Stop it.

She clenched her fists, clenched her will. _Just stop thinking like that._

Get up _._

 _Get up_ , she commanded herself, get _up_ , and even as her weakened elbows trembled from the weight of carrying herself, even as she thought that she can’t, she _will_ , because as he’d said—

_You must._

The white fist around the stem of the rose gripped it tightly.

_I must._

And so she got up. She pushed through, trudged forward, launching herself deeper, deeper into this graveyard of a forest, plunged as it was into the darkness of a moonless night. Her booted feet trampled upon dead twigs, her silken skirt billowed away from behind her to leave a trail of roused leaves in her purposeful wake, and the howling winds chanted songs of mourning into her ears, though failing to tempt her with the lure of surrender.

But they did steal from her warmth, because the winds brought with it a wintry cold; with every breath, ice clenched her lungs and she couldn’t breathe, breathe, _breathe_ her mind kept on screaming at her, even as her heart, beating a frenetic prestissimo, didn’t seem to care. Instead, like the pounding push of a percussionist’s rhythm, it kept on prodding for her to run, run, because she might be too late, _run_ , because she may never get another chance—

With a frustrated growl, she emerged from the skeletons of trees that had held her captive, sweeping away the branches to stumble free. But with her freedom, _she_

froze.

And there. There, in the midst of blacking shades of greys, he stood, one paw onto the hilt of his sword, his sweeping leather hat casting melancholic shadows over those lonely green eyes.

Her heart stopped.

Her breath caught in her throat, she was suddenly afraid to breathe—afraid that one wrong move might shatter this one fragile moment. One moment, that she’d been desperately looking for, hoping for, praying for, every single painful night. And now…

She found him.

They stood there, staring into each other, one calmly unmoving, and the other, frozen.

After the moments stretched, the ice thawed, and she dared close the distance between them, and was glad that he didn’t move away—very much unlike the night before.

 _Progress_ , she told herself, _progress. Good._

And then…

_Hold your breath. Steady._

He didn’t disappear.

_Good._

One more step.

_Forward—_

“Who… _are_ you?”

She waited in bated breath.

But it was when his features stretched into a sad smile that she knew. Knew that she’d made the wrong move. It was a sad smile that she knew all too well, and fear shot through her as relentless thoughts bombarded her forward.

With a desperate heart, she sprinted, she shot one paw out towards him, screaming _don’t go, please don’t go, don’t leave me alone, I’m so sorry, I’m sorry, just please don’t **go** , I just **need** to know your_ —

But like every night, he disappeared _just_ at the very moment she _thought_ she’d grasped him; and even as she fell through his ghost, she never hit the ground.

Instead, she woke up, feeling like her heart had just been ripped out from inside her chest.


	2. Grave Truths

**Part I**   
**The Fall of San Lorenzo**

* * *

_To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly be broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket—safe, dark, motionless, airless—it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. The alternative to tragedy is damnation. The only place outside of Heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all the dangers and perturbations of love is Hell.  
~Clive Staples Lewis_

* * *

 

[…]

Having just emerged from the Netherworldian portal, a sigh of relief escaped her mouth.

Oh, finally.

_All is well!_

Dulcinea closed her eyes and inhaled the rich crispness of the San Lorenzan night air. There was the faintest hint of smoke that lingered therein, like the aftermath of fire and steel scorching it over the grill, but the unusual scent was just probably what was left of the portal’s magical residue. After all, she’d just arrived after a nightful of an interdimensional war against the mind-controlled army of her best friend’s evil alter ego. How it seemed like centuries since she’d last breathed in the scent of home!

“Dulcinea?”

The white feline opened her eyes and turned to the tinny voice of Toby. Fisting at her skirt, she hop-skipped over to where her friends had gathered, and with a smile on her face, she twirled around in place and clapped her hands.

“Yes, I know!” chirped Dulcinea, “I can’t wait to see the others again! All the children, and Pajuna—they’d be delighted to hear that San Lorenzo is safe once more! We shall have a party at the cantina to celebrate!”

“Hey…uh, Dulcie?” There was an undertone of seriousness in Artephius’ usually craze-inflicted voice, and that was enough to make her stop.

“Huh? What is it? Is something…” The smile on her face dropped when she came to observe each of their faces. Toby’s was worried, Babieca’s was glum, and Artephius’ knitted brows could’ve spoken for themselves. “Why are you all so…”

The three of them made way for her as she dared take a step forward.

And all she could do was stare at what the sight beheld her.

“Ah, very good!” They all heard his voice carry on gleefully from behind them; Puss had been the last to step into the portal, and therefore the last to be released from the hold of its pressuring magic. “My friends, the dreaded portal is now blocked. All is well in San Lorenzo!”

Dulcinea felt a lump in her throat. She hated to destroy his moment of happiness—they’d barely taken a break yet from everything that had happened, and he didn’t deserve another battering for the sake of the town they loved.

“Not…really, Puss,” she called out to him, “You should see this!”

She heard his boots trod toward them. And when he fell in step right beside her, and took in the sight that beheld him…

Five tombstones, standing in a row. One for each of them all.

“It looks like…” Her voice was heavy. “Our graves.”

She let her eyes observe his astounded reaction, his mouth agape in disbelief. He’d stepped forward, and as his shadow fell onto his epitaph, lightning cracked at the sky to intensify the darkness—

in memory of Puss in Boots, former protector of San Lorenzo.

_Former protector of San Lorenzo._

“I…former?” He knelt before his tombstone, placed a paw on the blackened concrete, felt moss brush at his fur from underneath.

_Moss? But…_

He stood up and faced his friends. “But we have only been gone for less than a—“

Before he could finish the thought, lightning flashed; and the thunder was the ear-splitting crack of a whip lashing at the heavens. The ground shook violently, and one by one, the five of them lost their balance and fell onto the ground (Toby screamed, Artephius _Whoa!_ ed, Babieca frightenedly bucked and whinnied, and Puss and Dulcinea had somehow found each other’s support to keep standing, but fell anyway.) The scent of smoke grew ever stronger, and the night sky burned red. They heard a lone wolf howl from far away, and so chillingly it did, lasting for several drawn out seconds of chaos and confusion before it was joined by another, and another, and _another_ , until it seemed like the very earth itself sang a symphony of howling wolves—

_Until it seemed like the sky itself was falling apart—_

“Puss! Dulcinea! What’s happening!” As big and strong Toby was, he still was just a child, and the frightened look on his face so squeezed at Dulcinea’s heart as would a mother’s for her child.

“It’s alright, Toby!” she said, managing a smile as she crawled away from Puss to place a comforting paw on the terrified pig. “It’s going to be alright! We’ll all be here to p-p- _protect_ you.” She silently convinced herself that the stammer was because of the Earth’s tremors, and definitely _not_ because of some inward emotion and a tingling sense of doom that seemed to creep from inside her very bones. No, of course not. “Everything’s going to be just fine!”

As if her attempts at comfort were the magic words, the quakes stopped.

And for a moment, the five of them just stared at each other in bewildered silence, each of them breathing labouredly, Puss’ being the worst.

“What…had just…” He was, of course, the first one who had managed to get back onto his feet. He dragged his booted feet away from them to walk back to the crater—and as everyone watched, everyone could very well see the plain, obvious fact.

The portal had reopened into the depths of the Netherworld. The crater glowed a bubbling, ominous red, like a volcano rearing itself to erupt.

Dulcinea was just about to get up and run towards him, but just as she took the first step, it was at that exact moment when they all saw Puss in Boots, proud and self-proclaimed hero of San Lorenzo, collapse—his knees hitting just the edge of the crater’s mouth.

And even as he pounded his fists onto the ground with all his strength, the voice he ground out from his throat was torn and weak.

 _“Why_ … _”_

Dulcinea cringed at all the desperate, unspoken emotion she heard in that single, agonized word.

_I’ve done everything._

_Why is it, that the world would never deem it enough?_

“Puss?” She made sure to make her voice as gentle as she could possibly make it, handling him as though she were handling fragile glass.

A really very _really_ fragile piece of glass.

She took a meek step forward, her paws clasped behind her. “Maybe it’s just a little mistake? Maybe the Tiny Queen thought she could have something better than K’fhoggnarh, to, well, block the portal. Maybe nothing’s wrong, and…we’re just assuming the worst?”

“Can you not feel it, Dulcinea?” He stood up, turned to face her. And, as she took in the sight of him, the red light of the crater pouring from behind him to cast shadows all over his form, she thought she felt that something was different about this side of Puss. Gone was the usual jesting arrogance in those sparkling green eyes; instead, they were washed out into the bleaker shades of the night, a darker meaning taking over to conquer.

And that gaze froze her in place. Something was not right.

 _Puss?_ She thought, even as her paw wanted to reach out to him. _Are you…_

_…alright?_

But then eventually, he left her concerned blue stare to gesture at the others, who stood from behind her.  

“My friends, can you not _all_ feel it? Something is clearly amiss in San Lorenzo. Why did the earth tremble, why did the night sky suddenly transform into that hideous colour, why would the portal reopen impossibly _,_ and more importantly, why would _wolves_ howl in San Lorenzo, at our arrival? But well, I mean,” he said, rubbing at his chin thoughtfully, “I would, of course, understand why the earth would tremble at _my_ arrival, for I, Puss, in Boots…together with his loyal comrades, of course,” he added, chuckling nervously when Dulcinea crossed her arms over her chest and glared at him, “had just saved San Lorenzo from the danger posed by this…this…this _treacherous_ portal to the Netherworld!” He began to pace, paws on his back, shadows returning to cloud his eyes with seriousness. “What had happened while we were gone? Why would the Tiny Queen retract what we have been promised? Aha! I must go to the Netherworld at once to fix this problem! …Ah, no, no,” he said, returning to seriousness, “I must know the state of San Lorenzo first. Why is the sky red? Why is there smoke in the air? Why had wolves howled? _Why do we have graves?_ Had a century gone by? Have…” He gasped. “Have dogs taken over in our absence?!”

Toby gasped. “A century?! Isn’t that, like—“ gasp— “a _thousand years?_ ”— another _gasp_ — “Or maybe even a _hundred?!_ ”

“Oh, just a hundred, Toby. And _Puss_ ,” Dulcinea then shot the arrogant yet currently frantic Spaniard of a cat a look. “Stop overreacting, please. You keep scaring people unnecessarily.”

“Hmm!” said Artephius, his light bulb moment drawing the others’ attention. “Actually, Puss may have a point! Didn’t I say that time worked differently in the Netherworld? A century _may_ have passed, and we’d never even notice!”

Toby, Puss, and Dulcinea stared at him.

_“What?!”_

Puss ran a paw down his face. “Why did the people around here just _keep_ _on missing the important details?_ ”

“ _What?”_ The mage obliviously shrugged his thin shoulders. “Didn’t I tell you all that from the beginning?”

“No! _Artephius!”_ Even Babieca joined their protests by snorting and whinnying his apparent displeasure at the old mage. This crazy human could only drive cats and pigs and horses so far.

Artephius innocently shrugged his shoulders at the said stallion in response. “I _know_ , right? I wish I was a horse too.”

Before Puss had the chance to slap a paw at his forehead, an aftershock followed the first quake. But no, the ground didn’t shake, the _air_ did. They all felt it. Heard it, like electricity charging at the air and smoking it to ash. Coming at them from all sides, so ominously that even Artephius had the good grace to take a step back, anticipating danger. As all five of them backed into a centre—Puss had drawn his sword, commanded them to _all of you,_ _get behind me_ —they looked on at all of their sides, listening, as the sound of the stampede of marching feet, of occasional howls and guttural growling, drew nearer, nearer, ever _closer_ …

“Uh…” Toby looked around in fright. “Can anyone tell me what’s going on?!”

“Maybe it’s just the town?” Despite Dulcinea’s attempt at a pacifistic explanation, her voice was frantic, pitched even higher than usual. “And everybody’s just excited to come and greet us for our safe return?”

“ _Ha!_ ” cackled Artephius, holding at his stomach, “Oh hee hee, ha ha _hoo!_ That doesn’t even make any sense! Who ever heard of such a crazy idea? Don’t you hear the _howling_ , Dulcinea? The _wolves_ are excited to come _eat_ us for our safe return!”

Dulcinea felt her whiskers stick straight out as the first of the black, heaving wolves climbed to the edge and leapt onto the flatter surfaces of the slope, the rabid dogs pawing at the ground, hissing at the gangly group of five misfits.

Puss stared at them, putting his game face on. “These slobbering lupine beasts are definitely _not_ the people of San Lorenzo, Dulcinea.”  

The wolves crawled to them, slowly taunting, some of them definitely _grinning_ those wolfish grins, mocking Puss and the valiant point of his metal foil. Obviously, they were outnumbered, and Dulcinea could feel his taut tension when her shoulder bumped onto his. They all stuck even closer together as the now-laughing wolves swarmed the entire area.

She spared a look over to Puss, and immediately felt a pang of regret. She should have brought a sword with her in the first place, and it would _really_ be great to have all their powers back right now.

When it seemed that the wolves had stopped advancing towards them, Puss bravely puffed his chest out and stepped forward, protectively casting an arm to his left side—her side, she noticed—as he spoke.

“You! How dare you invade San Lorenzan territory!” All Dulcinea could do was stare at him as his powerful voice rippled across the pack and commanded them silence. She’d forgotten how much she appreciated that voice; she’d often heard it used with egotistical pride, sure, but only rarely did she hear it used with such honour and dignity. This character before her held a voice that belonged to a leader—a hero.

“I shall have to ask you to leave this town at once. Leave, and none of you will be harmed. For San Lorenzo is, once again, under the sword and protection, of Puss—” and in here he slashed down at the air with his sword— “ _in Boots!_ ”

His little speech drew out a long silence among his stunned audience.

For two seconds.

Because once again the crowd of wolves had burst into usurious laughter, the mockery staining the air red. Dulcinea was never the type to be inclined to any sort of violence, but seeing Puss, that insulted expression on his face, the way his paw tightened its hold onto his sword…

She clenched her fists by her side, and she surprised herself from the growl that began from deep within her throat. Maybe it was her natural, feline dislike of dogs, but maybe it was also the urge to come at her friend’s rescue—the urge growing like embers being fanned to flames.

Before any of the two cats could jump into the laughing gang and start a fight, however, a paw was raised into the air. It came from the middle of the crowd of wolves, and, as if the very gesture held a command, the pack silently separated themselves into neat halves as their apparent leader made his way forward.

Babieca bucked to a corner. Artephius, Toby, Puss, and Dulcinea had to crane their necks up as the wolf drew closer, and she grabbed at Puss’ free paw to urge him to take a step backward along with her—one might’ve thought that she should’ve grown used to his impulsive strikes against his enemies, but with an enemy like _this_ wolf, she didn’t want to be a witness of another of his reckless attacks.

And as the wolf drew himself up to his real, towering height, Dulcinea thought, flinching: _attacking would be a fatal mistake._

But of course, Puss wouldn’t know a clue if it hit him right in the face like a cold block of ice. He tore his arm from Dulcinea’s hold and boldly stepped before the alpha wolf, apparent leader of the pack.

“Who dares challenge my sword and skill?” he snarled. “ _Ha!_ Fight me, one-on-one, and you shall _lose_ —“ As quick and sharp as lightning, he struck his sword forward so that its sharp, tippy point touched the skin between the eyes of the startled wolf. “Villainous dog!”

And then the wolf did something completely unexpected.

“Whoa, whoa, _whoa!_ I mean you no harm! What’s with the racial _prejudice_ , man?” He was waving his paws into the air, backing away from the boot-clad ginger cat, as if he was giving himself up for arrest. “Just… _chillax_ , will ya? Down with the sword. Down. I said _down_.” He put a finger onto the point of the swordsman’s pointy weapon and drew it away from his face. With confusion written all over his expression, Puss warily lowered his weapon. He passed Dulcinea a look, and she had no response but a shrug—she was just as surprised as he. The said wolf had a surprisingly boyish voice, so very much the opposite of his imposing form and towering height, and contrary to the growling menace Dulcinea must have expected.

Puss wasn’t putting his sword back in its sheath, however. Though some of his tension had definitely been quelled, he was still very much guarded.

“So…” he began awkwardly, “Uh…”

“ _Finally!”_ hollered the wolf, spreading his arms to both sides as if to revere him. “You have arrived! Everybody’s been waiting so _long_ for this day, you can’t even imagine! We even had wolves on guard to give us a sign if the portal’s giving any clue of your arrival any time soon. We had many false alarms—of course you can’t avoid those—so you can’t imagine how _happy_ I am to finally see you in person. After all, I always wanted to get to know the dude who broke the town’s protective spell and left it vulnerable to the big bad world and some junk. But hey, don’t worry! I heard a lot of nice things about you too. _Great_ guy, they said. Did some neat _stuff_ , they said. You know, Pus in Boots, in your own little way…you really left a remarkable stain here on San Lorenzo.”

Puss’ pupils had shrunk into pinpricks, giving way to a more predatory glower.

“Ex _cuse_ me, señor?” He had raised his sword, and there was definitely a fight in his stance now. “How dare you say I stained San Lorenzo, at the same time staining my name? Pus! A disgusting word. My name is Puss. _Puss_ ,” he stressed, angrily stomping on the ground, _“in Boots!_ ”

The wolf rolled his eyes. “Of course, of course. _Geez_.”

“Let me hear you say it!”

The wolf sighed exasperatedly. “Okay, alright. Señor _Puss_ …” Then, he mockingly put a paw to his chest, his fanged grin catching the red flames of the bubbling crater. “…in Boots. My, you are so quick to violence. Can’t you just appreciate how glad I am that we meet at last?”

Puss met his gaze unflinchingly. He had dealt with the Bloodwolf. Surely he can deal with some more of his puny little friends.

“And to whom, pray tell, do I owe the _displeasure?_ ”

“Whoa.” The wolf drew out a long, patronizing whistle. “This kitty-cat has _fireballs_. I dig this guy!”

The crowd once again erupted into mocking laughter.

That did it.

 _“You!”_ And just as Puss seemed about ready to leap and scratch the guy’s eyeballs out—

Dulcinea ran to him and grabbed at his shoulder, startling him backward.

“Dulcinea! What—”

“ _Puss_. Look around us. We’re outnumbered!” She made sure that, though she’d hissed the words out, her voice was kept to a whisper. “We can’t just take on all of them at once!”

As Puss grumblingly let his eyes fall onto his sword, another voice had chirped in.

“Ooh, ooh! Yes we can!” insisted Toby, who’d too enthusiastically huddled to join the two of them, “We’ll just have to fight together, just like what we did back in the Netherworld!”

Babieca lividly neighed his agreement.

“Hmmm! Huh? Mm-hmm… _hmmm!_ ” Artephius thoughtfully stroke at his long beard, considering. “You know what, I think the horse has a point.”

Babieca arched a sceptical brow.

Dulcinea looked at the old man. Tolerably. “And that is…?”

Artephius shot a finger up to the sky. “We don’t have our powers anymore!”

Dulcinea _swore_ she saw the stallion roll his eyes at that, as if to say, _You think?_

By now, the wolves’ laughter had died out, and once again the alpha had turned his attention back to Puss. Only to suddenly gush at him.

“ _Aww!_ ” He fell to his knees as he seemed to fight the very strong urge to go suddenly pet him. “Look at them all, gathered round like meek little prey huddling before their predators!” Ignoring the growl he received from a very much irritated Puss, he turned his attention to Dulcinea—and the look on his face turned into devious.

“Ooh, _rawf_. And who is _this_ pretty lady?”

Dulcinea violently clawed away from the filthy paw that had been just about to pet her on her head. She bared her teeth at him, and finally let that growl free from her throat—oh, how _good_ it felt to just set the anger free. She smirked at the apparent shock on his face, once again surprising herself by not at all feeling the tiniest bit of sympathy for his now-wounded paw.

“ _Oh_.” Not being able to help herself, she further pitched the sass. “Not so pretty now, am I?”

Only when she actually hit the ground rolling did she realize that she’d been thrown into the air like a pathetic rag doll, and immediately regretted even saying anything in the first place. She heard her name being screamed by three different voices—“ _Dulcinea!_ ”—but for the moment her muscles just won’t seem to work. She tried to move her arms, her legs, she _tried_ to open her eyelids, but her entire body had been too numbed by the physical pain.

“ _Ha_.” So much derision was packed into that one word, it felt like a punch. “Not so _tough_ now, are ya?”

“You...” When she realized that the angry voice belonged unmistakably to Puss, her senses began to panic.

_Oh no oh no oh no._

The step of a boot.

“Do _not_.”

_No! Don’t fight them Puss, you’ll **lose!**_

“Hurt.”

The tiniest feeling came back first into her fingers, and so she was able to curl them into frustrated fists. _Puss…_

Another step.

“My.”

_Why didn’t I just keep my own mouth shut in the first place?!_

“ _Friends!_ ”

As if that single word was the heroic battle cry, war suddenly erupted from all around her. It was just as she’d finally managed to get her brain recover that she pushed herself up from the ground, groaning softly as she held her throbbing head. But when her senses began to sharpen back into focus—

Babieca was violently bucking around, kicking anyone unfortunate enough off the mountain and sending the wolves howling to their demise. Artephius and Toby were huddled together, back to back—the old mage had whipped out the poppies he hid from his robe with a triumphant ‘ _Aha!_ ’, confusing the wolves for a moment…until he started throwing the explosive pellets on their faces, the thick blue smoke making them cough and back away. It was right there when Toby took the chance and leapt into the air like a mighty “ _CANNONBALL!_ ” to reduce them into groaning heaps of fur.

Puss had of course taken to fight the leader of the gang, the alpha wolf, bravely facing him off even though his opponent was at least two times as he was tall. Dulcinea would have willingly watched him fight all day, but…

She shot up, and whirled around in an impressive 360 with a mighty “ _Yah!_ ” to kick her opponent’s nose bloody. He staggered backwards, backwards—until he stepped onto nothing but empty air and he fell down the slope with an agonized howl. She had sensed him carefully sneaking up from behind her, and had been waiting for the exact moment till she could have him hit… She never would have thought that she’d grown to be such the woman to do so, but alas, all her days of being in Puss in Boots’ wild and adventurous and dynamic company had all but trained her in the manners of a sharp fighter.

Seeing that she’d already gotten up from her little beauty sleep, and that she’d managed to incapacitate one of them no less, the wolves angrily turned their growling attention on her.

She was still a bit woozy from having her body battered up like dough, but _sure_ , she thought, lifting her dukes up and settling on a stance, _I could face a few wolves._

When she launched herself into the air, her claws were bared. She quickly scratched onto the faces of two opponents—they staggered out of her way, leaving her with apparently four more. Nonetheless, she took the fight on. As the first of them came screaming at her with a punch-packed fist, Dulcinea used it as leverage to haul herself up in the air, landing on his eye with the sharp stiletto heel of her boot—“Oh my gosh, I’m so sorry!”—and leaping from it to punch the second one who came after him, rendering him unconscious. She gracefully landed onto the ground with a fist stamped onto the floor, and then quickly sprang back up again to force an attacking wolf to release his sword by kicking him on his fingers and sending him crying back to his mother.

Dulcinea grabbed the fallen weapon and relished at the feeling in her paws. Over time, she had grown to understand why Puss just loved to swing that sword of his around—at first, she’d thought of him as a crazily impulsive egotist who had a strange hunger for violence, but now she knew that nothing could make one feel more secure and protected than the familiarly cold metallic touch of a weapon in your paws.

A competitive smile graced her face as she stared her opponents down.

Or up. Her height was…very incomparable.

“Alright! Who wants some more?”

When her challenging voice drew the attention of about ten more wolves—and about ten more from the other side, and maybe ten more from behind…she couldn’t really tell, for all she knew, _all_ the wolves had begun to gather around her!—she immediately regretted having said it in the first place.

“Ummm…” Okay. Puss’ competitiveness had certainly rubbed off on her, and she had to learn how to keep it under control. She blinked her eyes up at them innocently, and failed at her messy attempt at a sweet smile. “Can’t we do this on a one-on-one?”

She never would’ve lasted a fight with all of these wolves. Someone from behind her had grabbed her at the scruff of her neck and somebody else had wrestled her stolen sword from her, but she continued to struggle and growl to be freed as she was walked to their master.

“Argh! Let me _go_ , you fiendish wolves!”

The entire length of a sword had swished through the air as softly and deadly as the blade of a knife.

“ _Silence_.”

And suddenly, all Dulcinea could do was obey at the forceful demands of the blade being pressed to her throat, forcing her to tilt her head up and keep her mouth shut; and she was afraid that the slightest move will provoke the alpha wolf from doing something that she wouldn’t like later. The said wolf chuckled like a maniac at her helpless compliance.

_“Let…her…go!”_

Those words belonged to Puss. Though it was a struggle, she turned her head to look at him. He was just getting up from the ground with as much valiance as she knew him, though his wobbling knees were as obvious as day.

 _Wobble?_ thought Dulcinea, her heart clenching horribly, _What…horrendous **thing** …could possibly make Puss **wobble**? _

The alpha wolf didn’t so much as release the tension on his sword, pressing the length of its blade upon her throat. He didn’t break his eye contact with Puss.

“Drop your weapon first.”

Dulcinea was not having any of this. _“Puss—“_

The alpha wolf pressed the blade harder onto her throat, stealing her words into a choke.

Puss fisted a free paw. But with the other, he released his sword, and it clanged against the ground.

The sword was now thankfully drawn away from her throat, and she was released from the choking hold around her neck. She fell onto the ground in a breathless heap.

“Dulcinea!” His boots pattered towards her as she gasped for breath. She felt his arms around her as he looked on at her, concerned. “Dulcinea…did they hurt you? Are you alright?”

She felt herself blushing under her white fur, but she firmly met his green eyes her own blue ones.

“I am now.”

The moment was destroyed when they heard the clanging of metal chains.

“Your freedom, then, if you please.”

Puss had offered her a paw, and the both of them gracefully stood up to face the wolves that towered from all around them. “Uh, okay. This is hardly a fair fight, what with us being _clearly_ outnumbered and very much fatigued by all the interworldly travel, so can we possibly call for a time out?”

The alpha wolf nodded his head. “Oh, yeah, _sure_ , you’re _clearly_ outnumbered, but you idiots still decided to take on us, didn’tcha. Ha! The Emperor-King would be soooo _pleased_ to hear this.” He turned his head to command at his inferiors. “Move, all of you! _Chain the prisoners!_ ”

Dulcinea blinked. “ _What_ did you say?”

“Wait.” Apparently, Puss didn’t miss it as well. “ _Emperor-King?_ ”

Nobody answered his question as he was gruffly handled by the neck so that they could put the chains around his paws—eventually locking them with thick, metal cuffs. The same had been done to Dulcinea, before she was pushed roughly to the ground just beside where Puss had just been thrown. When they managed to get their bearings back, she exchanged a look with him, feeling her whiskers stick straight out.

_An Emperor…King…?_

_In San Lorenzo?_

She had a very familiarly bad feeling about this….

“ _Hey!_ Bad dog! Bad, _bad!_ ”

All heads turned towards Artephius, who was passionately slapping at a poor wolf’s head with each ‘ _bad!_ ’ word. Puss and Dulcinea looked questioningly at Toby and Babieca, who were already cuffed and/or chained as well—but neither could provide an answer to their confusion with their shrugs. To the eyes of any onlooker, this situation was apparently all too clear: Artephius was the last man standing, simply refusing to be stolen of his freedom.

But of course, that would’ve been too sane.

“Hey, hey, _hey,_ old dude!” The alpha had stepped up to serve as a referee, extremely annoyed. “Stop slapping at my subordinate! Just give it up!”

“ _Bad dog!_ ” Artephius kept on like he hadn’t heard anything. “Bad, bad, bad!”

“Ow! Ow! _OWW!_ Hey, what’s your _deal_ , man?”

The alpha ran a paw down his face as the show went on. “Can anyone explain what the _meaning_ of this is?”

“ _He_ —” The poor wolf subordinate had taken a step away to caress his apparently abused head. “He won’t let go of his popcorn, sir!”

_“Popcorn?!”_

“That’s right!” chimed Artephius, “No one takes my popcorn away!”

Puss groaned.

“Artephius…” Dulcinea began, like a mother gently prodding her child out of a lie. “Where did you get that popcorn?”

He shrugged his thin shoulders. “Eh, I started running out of poppies, so I figured, _hey_ , popcorn!” Here Artephius revealed the bag of popcorn he was hiding. “But then, I quickly realized that they don’t actually go pop. Like, sure, I _get_ it, they’re _corns_ , but they don’t _pop_ , so shouldn’t they be called non-popping corns? And I was like, _gasp!_ Look away, look away! I wasn’t _popcorn_ after all _—_ and after all these painful years, why would you _lie_ to me, mother? _Why would you LIE?!_ But anyway.” He popped one of the popcorns into his mouth, and held the bag out for Dulcinea.

“Want some?”


	3. Empire Thirteen

Dulcinea didn’t know whether to feel amused, saddened, or righteously upset for Artephius when the wolves took his popcorn away and tossed it down the bubbling cauldron of a portal that led to the Netherworld.

But perhaps, contemplating on her conflicted feelings was just a way for her to ignore the suddenly very silent and non-violent swordsman beside her. He hadn’t looked at her yet, not once, since they’d been forced to their feet by the alpha wolf, commanding them to _get moving, you lousy creatures, you are our prisoners now!_ Every time she looked at him, she’d only see the shadows cast onto his eyes by that damnable hat—that feathered leather hat he’d always taken proud of for the reputable ‘hero’ symbol it brought him.

She really didn’t care about any of his symbolic fiddlefuff. For her, the treasure wasn’t the reputations and symbols and all that useless materialistic whatnot—the treasure was instead his golden heart. And she wanted to look at him, not as the pressured hero of San Lorenzo, but as her best friend. She wanted to ask him if he was okay even though he obviously wasn’t, just so she could hear his voice…make sure he was still alive, his soul fighting to live, trapped as it was inside the blank emptiness he was displaying right now.

And how she wished that he _was_ only doing this for an outward display. He’d always had a flair for the dramatics, being the elaborate showman that he’d always been, but she didn’t want him to truly feel this…detached. It was almost as if she wanted him to lift his sword up again and fight, if only they weren’t utterly outsized and outnumbered. Anything but this impassivity.

As she was forced up on her feet, (the chains dangling from her paws with every step she took), she looked back at the crater, where sparks of heat continued to dance and lull the air into a reddish hue. She can’t think of a reason why it would just all too suddenly open up like that, as if nothing had ever happened! It would be so very grossly uncharacteristic of the Tiny Queen to let such a quandary pass, not only because she was a Queen and Queens must be of noble words, but because she seemed truly sincere in her desire to return the favour after Puss, her, and the rest of the gang had freed Netherworld from the abusive reign of the Blind King.

And she’d seen it. She’d seen the Tiny Queen bring K’fhoggnarh with her, gallantly ready to use the giantess as a glorified plug that would seal the unclosable portal—the one that had been bugging the people of San Lorenzo, ever since Uli brought upon its curse with the Bloodwolf.

So why? Why would the Tiny Queen let the portal open again? Did something wrong happen from the other side? Or had the Queen lied about her promises to help? Had they been lied to? Was what Artephius said true, that a century _may_ have passed, and through all this time, the Netherworldian portal had reopened despite their efforts? Did none of their sacrifices matter, were all of it gone to waste?

All of these questions got dashed away when a more important one dropped into her head like a coin.

_Was Puss blaming himself?_

Analysing the situation only made her head hurt. But truly, all Dulcinea wanted to do at that moment was to turn him by the shoulders to _face_ her, so she could shake him, _wake_ him, say _Puss, I **know** what you’re thinking, and I tell you to **stop** thinking it. It’s not your fault, you couldn’t have done anything to stop it. And no matter what happens, nothing will change the fact. You are the truest hero San Lorenzo has ever had._

Because no. No, it wasn’t lost on Dulcinea how much Puss had been desperately clinging to that self-proclaimed title ever since the first day, when he decided to take both the responsibility and the mantle as the sword, protector, and hero of San Lorenzo. To anyone else, him putting on such a colourful name was just his self-entitlement speaking; it certainly _was_ an annoying, shallow arrogance that could take some time getting used to…

And some time getting to understand. Dulcinea could say so confidently, as she’d gotten to know Puss better than he seemed to know himself during the short time they’ve been together. And now, she was aware, that Puss was letting his arrogance take hold of him again, feeling guilty in the exact grand situations where he _shouldn’t_ be. All Dulcinea wanted was to knock some sense through that thick furry head of his, that _no, Puss, stop **blaming** yourself for your dear Felina’s sake_ , shielded as he was by layers and layers of ego and overbearing pride.

But of course, she currently can’t, and, surprising herself yet again with uncharacteristic violence, she _cursed_ the chains that bound her and her friends, _cursed_ the wolves that held them prisoners. She prayed viciously to Sino that these bullies would be punished rightfully for this torture. All five of them, immobilized by the cuffs on their wrists and dragged along by the chains on their necks like slaves for sale, had been forced to walk in a single line, so if they had to hold a conversation, they’d have to say it aloud for everyone else to hear. Babieca was at the rear, followed by Artephius—who kept on about his popcorn and all the big bad wolves. Toby was next, and because he was just right behind her, Dulcinea could hear the frightened orphan pig’s every whimper, every pained whisper of “Are they going to hurt us, Dulcinea?” And it hurt her deeply that she can do no more action than words of comfort that didn’t mean anything, now that she was powerless to even set herself free.

And Puss in Boots…naturally, he had to be the first in line, the first to face whatever monstrosity lay ahead, ever ready to protect, ever duty-bound to fight, ever prepared to make the sacrifice of a hero. He may have given up his sword, but despite his silence, Dulcinea could tell that he hadn’t yet given up his spirit—no, not entirely, and this was enough to give her some solace.

He was just in front of her, marching as the alpha wolf had so commanded. And in that moment, as all five prisoners marched from the mountain, down the stairs etched onto the slope, with all the wolves standing guard…Dulcinea couldn’t help but feel a bit of misplaced guilt herself. After all, if it wasn’t for her sake, they wouldn’t have to be marching down, cuffed and chained like helpless victims. If it wasn’t for her sake, Puss wouldn’t have been forced to drop his sword—if it wasn’t for her sake, Puss would’ve rather continued fighting until the end.

So Dulcinea couldn’t help the surge of anger that flared in her when the said alpha wolf harshly tugged onto the chain on his neck to urge him forward. At that moment, Puss had been—or seemed, she couldn’t be sure—too empty and lifeless to support himself with that wobble in his legs, so he should have collapsed to the ground onto his knees—

Hadn’t Dulcinea been quick to hold him by his arms and catch him before he fell.

“Move faster, _cats_ ,” said the alpha wolf, ignoring the glare Dulcinea shot him with as he spat that single word with much condescension and disgust. He smirked, revealing his fangs. “The Emperor-King really _would_ be delighted to see you both. The pig and the horse and the old man, believe me, are just the sweet bonuses.”

When the alpha wolf turned his back at them and commanded everybody to begin marching down again, Dulcinea helped Puss back to his feet and took her chance to talk to him again.

“Are you okay, Puss? Were you…” She addressed his slightly wobbling knee. “…hurt during your fight with the alpha wolf?”

And then, suddenly, she couldn’t seem to help it. “Puss, I’m really so sorry, if I…I—”

He smiled and held up a finger to her lips to halt her. “Nothing to apologize for, Dulcinea. My duty to protect is above my duty to fight. And truly. I am alright.” Then he removed that finger from her lips and put his paw onto his chest, this time smiling with quieter sincerity. “Thank you, my friend, for being my strength in my time of weakness.”

A warning tingle shot up her spine. Typical of him, saying things so dramatically sentimental that it scared her to the bone. What was he thinking now? She really hoped it wasn’t anything crazy, because as far as she knew, a mentally and emotionally compromised Puss can never bring anyone anything good.

“Puss…”

“What?” he teased, smiling suddenly. That spark of arrogance in his eyes might have annoyed her in the past, but now it was an utter relief. Just as they had been commanded, he proceeded back to marching forward; but he made certain to look back at her in mock incredulity to continue his jest. “Dulcinea, you offend me mortally. After all the time we’ve been together, my lady still worries over her valiant knight?”

How it felt glad to roll her eyes at one of his flirty antics again, like it was just a normal day in San Lorenzo of kicking thieves’ butts.

She lifted her head, returning his smile with one of her own. “Oh, Puss. You wouldn’t have been alive for so long if it wasn’t for me worrying over you, kitty dumdum.”

“Ah, yes.” He chuckled lowly at her lousy attempt at sass, in that charming yet slightly patronizing way he did (it annoyed Dulcinea how smoothly he managed to pull that off). “Of course, Dulcinea. I owe it all, everything, including my continued, passionately meaningful existence—” those green eyes caught hers, trapping her blue gaze like a fluttering butterfly snared by spider’s web— “to you.”

For all his bloated ego, he certainly was a romancer with words. All Dulcinea could do at the moment was stare at him in honest astonishment.

After all, nothing except beautiful poetry could ever catch her as stunned, and in that moment, Puss in Boots in himself was a walking masterpiece.

That is, until the both of them seemed to realize the ridiculous depth of his words.

Puss was immediately embarrassed, and seemed to regret he’d even said anything in the first place when he sharply turned away and kept marching like nothing happened. Dulcinea decidedly spared him the giggle from her throat by instead coughing distractedly into a fist, all while she blushed mightily underneath her white fur.

She didn’t see Toby and Artephius make silent gagging actions from behind her—naturally, they had witnessed the entire thing. Thankfully, one creature decided to take this like an adult, with Babieca the mighty stallion dramatically rolling his eyes at the immature little kids.

The rest of the march down continued on with silence. There were the occasional snickers from the wolves that flanked both their sides, as the brutes held the chains that connected the shackles around their necks. The alpha wolf was the one who held Puss’ chained collar, urging him to keep marching forward. They moved farther and farther down the slope, and with each excruciating step, there were fewer boulders to obstruct their view—and therefore more of San Lorenzo revealed to their eyes.

Or what was left of it.

Everything had been burned to the ground. There was but the sharp, stinging scent of smoke, a cruel aftermath of what must have been a recent fire…or bombing. The buildings had been crushed, and no house had a rooftop left to shield it from the cruelty of the sun or the pattering of the rain. The concrete were demolished into pointless, charred ruins, as if someone had thrown a dynamite on its direction for fun—turning back to cover their ears as they waited for the inevitable _BANG!_ , and then cheering on like maniacal psychopaths as people, goblins, skeletons and cows rushed out of their hiding place, shivering with mad anger yet too afraid to fight, striving to end day by day alive by avoiding getting in the way of these wolves’ line of fire. The gruesome mental and physical image combined so horrified faint-hearted Dulcinea that she could do nothing but fall to her knees and sob.

Because this was plain, outright horror—this was domination, this was tyranny, this was _destruction_. Whoever these invaders were, she wanted them out, _out_ of her town, she wanted them to _leave!_ But, as optimistic as she desperately tried to keep herself up to be, reality kept on hitting her down with the plain, cold fact: that it was hopeless. Because what _can_ they do? What can _she_ do? They were but a group of five powerless creatures, and even if they did have the power, their combined forces would be a laughable contrast against this huge number of wolves.

And what of the mad beast who controlled them? How powerful was he, whoever this Emperor-King was? And _why_ , she thought, as the tears just kept streaming on, why would this Emperor-King just mindlessly attack on a vulnerable, kind, peaceful, innocent community? With all its orphaned children, living day by day with smiles on their faces as they played together, fought together, ate dinner together, like true blood brothers and sisters would? With Pajuna and her cantina, ever ready to serve the community, even if no one paid a single dime? With its faithful Mayor Temeroso, protective of his town just as much he was protective of his barrels? With Señora Zapata, who held deep love for San Lorenzo’s orphaned children even though she never admitted it? With all its citizens, who got up on mornings greeting each other, _loving_ each other, like family?

Why would anyone want to steal that beautiful happiness of San Lorenzo?

How could anyone be so _cruel?_

“Is…” It was Toby’s voice. “Is this…is this San Lorenzo now?” It was tiny. Scared. “But…but…but where’s the orphanage?” Because the shoe that had once been the orphanage was nothing but a blackened piece of coal. “Where’s Cleevil? And Kid Pickles? And Esme, and Señora Zapata, and Pajuna, and…and Vina?” The boy’s thin, shrilly voice was growing in intensity, and he was utterly desperate for a grown up to take control of the reigns and tell him that this was just a dream and everything was going to be alright because _that was what he wanted to believe_. “Dulcinea, they’re still here, right? They _gotta_ be here, right?”

Dulcinea had been screaming inside all this time, and she couldn’t keep it inside anymore. “The children,” she said, her voice trembling from all her sobbing. And then, she pounded both her fists onto the ground with all her pent up anger. “ _The children!_ Where are they? Are they alive? Are they _here?_ _Answer me!_ Where _are_ they? Where— _where_ —are… _the_ — _!_ ”

To think that everything she’d grown to love was now reduced to mere memory was ripping her heart apart. Overwhelmed by a new wave of tears, she turned to sob to her paws again.

It hurt her to think that the children were most probably being held prisoners in their own home, being fed with nothing but grit, cooped up inside charred walls and broken windows and waking up first thing in the morning startled by an explosion, and going to bed with smoke lingering in the air.

It hurt her, and she hated to be selfish, but she wanted them _alive_.

She almost didn’t hear his voice in the sound of her sobbing, but the growling anger clearly rippled from underneath, bubbling a silent rage, only barely hidden by the sense of control he falsely displayed.

“What in the _hell_ …” His voice cracked under the pressure of his anger, revealing a pain underneath.

“…did you demonic fiends _do_ to San Lorenzo?”

As he finished his painfully spoken statement, a few mocking snickers erupted from the crowd. But before the alpha wolf could say something snarky—

“No, Puss!” blurted Artephius suddenly, and the loss of jest in his voice chilled Dulcinea. “Look, don’t worry, everybody, I have some shocking news to make!” Then he raised his hands into the air as if he was making an announcement, the chains making their metallic clangs as they hung down from his wrists. “Alright, listen up! This is NOT our town! It must be some semi-hemispheric loop membrane mistake, causing us to stumble into the wrong alternate universe instead of San Lorenzo. I mean, it _can’t_ be! Call me crazy, but what I’m seeing right now _just_ _couldn’t be—!_ ”

The wolf holding on Artephius’ chains yanked it hard enough to the right to shut him up. The alpha wolf stared at the five of them, then grinned when his eyes landed onto Babieca, who was thoroughly frightened at the unusual sight of his home burnt up into ashes.

Theatrically curling up his wrist, the alpha wolf mockingly bowed before them, just as a soldier would to his majesty.

“Well, perhaps it is time that I _officially_ welcome thee, lady and gentlemen,” he said, “to the Emperor-King’s new domain. By the will of his majesty, the name of this town has been hereby changed to Empire Thirteen—”

He showed all his teeth in a fanged grin.

“…formerly known as San Lorenzo.”

* * *

After the five prisoners have been escorted down the stairs of the mountain slope, they kept trudging forward, deeper into the centre of the town. Babieca snorted and backed violently every time some scrap of rooftop fell and collapsed to the ground in a mighty heap of ash and ruins. Even Artephius seemed to have been drained of crazy things to say when faced with the destruction of his town—and Dulcinea couldn’t possibly bear the look on the old mage’s face when they passed by Owlberto, its walls now charred and blackened by smoke and fire, its windows cracked and demolished, a smattering pile of ash and broken wood surrounding his once lovely home.

Toby had finally broken down into sobs at the sight of _his_ home, the Orphanage; and Dulcinea had to fight on the chains holding her at the neck to go to him who’d she considered as her own child all these years. When they were done and the poor child was nothing but a shivering mess, they were forced to march again.

Where Pajuna’s cantina once was lay broken pieces of wood, as if it had been beaten to the ground until these monstrous, barbaric brutes were satisfied of the havoc they wreaked.

The fountain was in no better shape—though calling it a fountain would be stretching it too far. Because right now, it was nothing but a pile of marble stones that leaked dirty water, staining the ground wet.

And the treasure house. It had to be the one building mostly undamaged in the entire town—though the blackened walls, charred by _fire_ it seemed, were not missed. The five of them, with Puss at the lead, stared at it incredulously—because _mostly undamaged_ meant that the treasure house seemed like it had been picked up by a child, thrown and thrashed and banged around like a toy until it spilled all its golden bits of guts, and then was tossed back down when it no longer entertained him. Golden coins were scattered about the ground, mystic treasure treated like garbage, as vagabond thieves crept up to them, thinking no one saw them, and bagging every gold they could into their sack before running away to wherever place they thought to spend their money on junk.

Once, they’d ventured on a quest to retrieve all of San Lorenzo’s lost treasure in hopes of reactivating the spell that concealed their town from the rest of the world. But now, with random thieves lurking about everywhere, every single coin, every single tiny treasure, must have been somewhere in the other side of the world now…adding to it the fact that they’ve been gone for who knows how long. Even with the help of the mystic silver dousing rod of Akhenaten, it was going to take centuries to find every single treasure, and they’d probably get killed along the way anyway, so the single fact remained—

_It’s going to be impossible to return the spell now._

Puss looked like he was about ready to throw up. He wobbled on his legs for a moment, before he fell to the ground in hopeless despair, his eyes wide and his lungs breathless, his fists clenched as if all he wanted was to punch _something_ to death.

“Puss!” She wanted to run to his side, but the pull on her neck prevented her. The alpha wolf chuckled, cruelly pleased of his prisoners’ anguish. He pulled up on Puss’ chain to force him back to his feet.

 _“Keep moving!”_ he commanded.

The five could do nothing but obey.

And with wolves flanking both their sides, they marched toward the treasure house. With a wave of the alpha wolf’s paw, the two wolves that stood guard before the mighty doors proceeded to open it for their visitors, smirking as they filed inside the great halls of the treasure house. But once they’d entered…

“Wha… _what?_ ” It was the voice of Kid Pickles, and all five of their heads turned to the side, where they saw him, crawling to the bars of the cage that held him prisoner. “Puss? Dulcinea? You’re…you’re _alive?_ ”

“They’re alive,” said one more voice, and this one belonged to Pajuna, coming from their right. “You’re…you’re all alive! I can’t believe it! _You’re alive!_ ”

With that said, noise seemed to erupt all around the treasure house—or, as they soon found out, the _prisoner_ house. From all their sides, instead of the golden piles and piles of treasure, there was nothing but bars, caging the people of San Lorenzo like animals inside a den. A chatter rose into the air, and there was wonder in every pair of eyes that befell the returned heroes, marvelling at them with such amazement as if they’d just witnessed corpses be resurrected back to life.

“Toby? Is that…”

“ _Vina?_ ”

“Puss? Dulcinea?”

“Eames!”

“Dulcinea!” The little orphan girl’s cry could’ve shredded at her already torn heart. “ _You’re back!”_

_“Esme!”_

“ _Puss in the Boots?!_ ” erupted Señora Zapata, holding Esme close to her chest, “You are all…!”

“Arty?”

_“Duchie?”_

“Oh, _Arty!_ ” cried the Duchess, “I thought you… _I thought you were dead!”_

“They… have come back to save us.” This one voice belonged to a San Lorenzan whose battered face was overshadowed by his hat as he crawled to the bars of his cage to squint at them. “They have come back to save us.”

“ _Save us!_ ” cheered someone else, provoking a chant until everybody joined. “Save us! Save us! Save us!”

Puss took a step back as he absorbed their frantic cheering, the responsibility as their protector and saviour heavily falling to his shoulders, with each and every desperate cry—filling the entire chamber with sunlight hope and impossible optimism.

_Oh, good old San Lorenzo…_

“Save us! Save us! Save us! Save—”

_“ENOUGH!”_

Everyone was startled into silence. Puss, Dulcinea, Toby, Artephius and Babieca backed together as they observed the once cheerful den of inspired prisoners fall into fright, all their eyes looking to the figure who’d just issued the command. He was a dark figure sitting— _slouching_ —on his throne of rubies and gold, a throne sitting upon where Sino’s statue had once been, a throne surrounded by piles of gold and jewels and mystic treasure.

The alpha wolf stepped forward and dropped to a knee, pounding a fist reverently to his chest when he bowed his head low before his ruler.

“My Emperor-King,” he began, “it is my honour to bring before you the newest prisoners of Empire Thirteen, fallen heroes of former San Lorenzo.”

This… _Emperor-King_ …was shrouded by too much darkness to be recognized, but they did sense him move from the lazy slouch on his throne, and get up. Each footfall echoed ominously across the entire chamber, provoking each prisoner back into the darkness of their cages, and prompting Puss to get in front of his friends and stand before them protectively, making Dulcinea wonder how he managed to remain as valiant even without his sword and freedom, always thinking of others first before he saved himself.

When the Emperor-King stepped into the gloomy light of the torches, he smirked at the shock that befell them.

Dulcinea was the first to find her voice.

_“Evil Puss?!”_

“Surprise surprise.”

“But you—you’re supposed to be—“

Evil Puss laughed manically at Dulcinea as he swung a sword lazily around, basking in the shock of his prisoners.

“Well, well, _well_ ,” said the deposed Blind King, the newly hailed Emperor of San Lorenzo, “It looks like our guests of honour have finally arrived to the party. What took you guys so long? This calls for a celebration!”

“But you,” choked Puss in Boots, having nothing else to say, “we have just deposed you from being the king of the Netherworld. That was not even ten minutes ago!”

Evil Puss—the Emperor-King—mockingly pouted at him, as if he were correcting a foolish five-year-old that no, no, _no_ , one plus one did _not_ equal to eleven.

“My dear, _dear_ Puss in Boots,” he chided, nearing his face dangerously close to his—his eyes no longer the black holes they’d once been, now instead filled with tense, viridian green. “How about I tell you a fun fact?”

He paused for dramatic effect. Then smirked.

“You were late for ten years.”


	4. Back With a Vengeance

Puss recoiled violently from him and all but screamed out his lungs.

“We have been gone _—for ten years?!”_

The entire court was rendered silent.

For two seconds.

His evil counterpart lost his serious face and burst out into explosive laughter, keeling over and slapping at his knees, prompting the rest of the wolves to join him in his mirth.

“ _Ha!_ YOU SHOULD HAVE SEEN YOUR FACES!”

And he continued laughing.

Dulcinea was not pleased. She stepped harshly down his tail, making him yelp and jump back.

“ _Hey!_ ” protested the angry ‘Emperor-King’. “What gives? I mean, I _did_ say I was gonna give him a _fun_ fact…”

“From your mocking laughter, even I can reckon that it is most certainly clear that it is _not_ a fact! What is the meaning of this?” demanded Puss. “Have we really been gone for ten years? Tell us honestly, or I shall have your skin flayed and burned to the furnace!”

“Wait.” That caught the laughing Emperor’s attention like fish on a hook. “Wait, whoa-whoa-whoa- _wait_ , wait a minute there. Did you just…” He looked at Puss in wonder, as if sceptical that a creature such as him could ever even exist. “Did you just actually _threaten_ me? While you are helplessly bound in chains? While you are cuffed and rendered immobile? While you are pathetically unarmed? While you’re practically surrounded by enemies? How _stupid_ —” with a flash, he snapped the point of his sword at his nemesis, “ _are_ you?”

Puss in Boots did not flinch nor blink nor turned his head away. “As stupid as possible,” he nobly responded, “if it means protecting my friends!”

Emperor Puss shook his head at him, all the while muttering to himself, _unbelievable idiot_. “Oh my. Oh me.” He started chuckling. “Am I glad that I didn’t end up being _your_ version of me.”

“This version of Puss whom you mock,” growled Puss, “is Puss in Boots, hero of San Lorenzo. And I hereby demand you—“

“Okay, _alright_ , it wasn’t ten years, just one, if you just _please_ shut up. You happy now?”

Though largely reduced and much better than ten, the weight of the number was not lost.

“A…year?”

It took him moments for that to properly sink in.

Twelve months.

Fifty-two weeks.

Three hundred and sixty-five days.

An… _incomputable number of hours!_

“I have left San Lorenzo unprotected for an entire year?! But…but _how?_ What is this deviltry?! I demand you tell me, fiendish fiend!”

Evil Puss scoffed. “Ha! Like I’m gonna tell you!”

Dulcinea stepped up. “How is this possible, Evil Puss? What did you _do?_ ”

He was silent for a moment, pretending to carefully contemplate his choices first, before he finally gave in with an overly dramatic sigh.

“Oh, I guess I can’t…” His lips lifted in a smile, and he wiggled his eyebrows flirtatiously at her, “refuse a lady.”

She rolled her eyes, and then vehemently refused to give him her paws when he attempted to grab them into his own. He shrugged, and simply settled with circling them and eyeing them like how a predator eyes prey. 

“So, for all five of you…from the time you found out that Little Pequeña was my loyal spy, to when you’ve ventured into the portal to the Netherworld, to when you’ve planned an uprising against the throne with old Hecate, to when you have summoned my _good_ friend K’fhoggnarh and thought you’ve defeated me, all events leading to the oh-so-unfortunate now…” He sniggered at his fuming prisoners. “All of it must have felt like less than a day. So what a shock it must be, to find out you’ve left your town vulnerable for an entire year in the power of my paws! Wouldn’t you say so—” he snapped his gaze at her, “Dulcinea?”

He’d recounted the story with such a mesmerizing silken voice that it sounded like a professor delivering a lecture—you cannot take your eyes off of him, because the second you do is the second you trip over the hypnotic trance you didn’t know he’d already cast upon you and everybody else. So it was when he’d suddenly turned his attention to her that Dulcinea felt like she’d just been suddenly jerked out of the elemental song of the water and she was gaping at him like an awestruck fish, speechless.

Then she shook her head, forced herself to _get a grip of yourself, don’t let him_ think _he had you_ , began to speak—

“I—“

“But! For your information,” he cut off rudely, smirking indecently at her outraged reaction for being interrupted, (‘That naughty rascal…he did that on purpose!’) “for the rest of us? It felt different. It felt like _months_ , because that’s how long you kept us waiting. And how is that possible, you ask?” He smiled. “You see, my little ones, time works differently in the Netherworld. A century may have passed, and you wouldn’t even notice! Like, how awesome and terrible is that? You tell me. Huh? Huh?”

Artephius immediately jumped at that. “Hey! I already said that! Copyright violation! _You evil villain!_ ”

The wolves tugged on the chains on Artephius’ throat before he could go bite their beloved Emperor-King. Evil Puss just smiled that condescending smile of his, and never had anyone made Dulcinea _want_ to punch somebody so hard in the face to the point of mutilation, ever since Jack Sprat.

“Back off, crazy old man, or I’ll let the wolves have their fill!” chuckled the Emperor. “Anyway, let me tell you all my story.”

“Aurgh, and ‘ere we go again,” they heard Pajuna grump.

The self-proclaimed emperor continued on like he hadn’t even heard her.

“So, right after you summoned K’fhoggnarh with that ridiculous dance of yours,” and in here, he passed Puss a sparing glance; with Dulcinea feeling a tinge of satisfaction in her stomach to hear the telling annoyance in his tone, “and the Tiny Queen commanded the beast to _step_ on me…I was hopeless. I thought that my end has finally come. My life flashed before my eyes as I screamed at my incoming doom, until I soon realized that…” His eyes widened, and he put a palm on his chest, “I still actually have the chance to save myself from such a horrible fate.”

He paused, as if to let his words sink into his audience first. And then Artephius gasped.

“The mercuric chalk!” he said, “The one he used where he could have gone anywhere!”

Evil Puss chuckled, glad that even that crazy old man was actually catching on.

“I know, _brilliant_ , right? Stole it from you right after you sent the other Pusses back their homes. So don’t worry, imbecilic sorcerer, I’m probably not gonna kill you yet. Someone with a vast knowledge of alchemy like you might actually be…useful for me in the future.” And then, haughtily walking away from Artephius, he continued his story.

“So, just when that giant monster K’fhoggnarh was about to step on me, I immediately seized the chalk from my boot, and hastily drew a portal for myself—where I accidentally landed in my own world. It was then that I realized that Netherworldian time did not move as quickly as the time in my universe did. Because I soon found that in my own world, ten years have already passed! Ten entire years, and I assure you, I’m not jesting this time.” As he said this, a shadow fell onto his eyes and darkness tinted his voice. “And upon my return, I was rejected by everyone I know.”

A few seconds of silence passed before he scoffed at his own sentimentality. “Except, of course,” he bragged, extending an arm to gesture at all the wolves present inside the chamber, “my ever loyal army.”

Dulcinea thought she heard some wolves from behind her excitedly chatter at that.

“Hey, did you hear that?”

“He’s talking about us!”

“So then, with a vengeful heart,” he continued in that silky smooth voice of his, “I vowed to reproduce the mercuric chalk, with the…rather unwilling help of a sorcerer, but the details are not important.” He waved a paw as if he was swatting away an annoying fly. “I then used the chalk to transport myself and my army here in _your_ world, Puss in Boots…but I guess we ended up landing one year too early. But it wasn’t a big issue; I used all that time doing productive stuff, so don’t worry! Stuff like conquering everything your dear San Lorenzo can offer. I burned it to cinders, disciplined its rowdy citizens, turned it into my very own empire, where all worship me, praise me, adore me, and _fear_ me, as they should a god.” He ticked each item off his fingers, saying them like such despicable actions were something he should be proud of.

“San Lorenzo would _never—!_ “

“Oh!” he said, as if he’d just remembered something, “And I also renamed it Empire Thirteen.”

Dulcinea had never been so angry. “ _No!_ San Lorenzo will _always_ remain to be San Lorenzo!”

“Oh, really.” He tsk-tsked, not at all bothered by all that bottled anger. “And what choice do you have, except to conform? After all,” he walked backwards and spread his arms wide, proudly claiming the entire place his own, “I am its emperor now.”

“But…” Everybody’s heads immediately turned to Toby’s direction, who had been scared into silence all this while. “That doesn’t explain why the portal to the Netherworld opened again, just after the Tiny Queen promised to seal it.”

“Oh my gods. Are you _stupid?_ ” blurted Evil Puss, incredulous and amused. “With me meddling repeatedly into the fabric of time and space, you don’t think this world and the Netherworld weren’t both thrown off balance as a result? You see, while you and your friends were gone, little piggy, San Lorenzo has, let’s say _suffered_ , the consequences of my actions.” But suddenly, he stopped, froze, thoughtful. “Or was it…was it _your_ actions, Puss in Boots?” he said, tapping his boot and stroking at his chin. “We _are_ one after all, two sides of the same coin…”

“We,” growled the cuffed swordsman, “are _not the same_.”

Evil Puss shrugged it off with a smirk. “If you say so. So anyway, while you were gone, San Lorenzo has been through a lot. And I mean a _lot_. The imbalance deeply affected the Netherworld as well, that even the Tiny Queen couldn’t leave poor K’fhoggnarh behind as the portal’s glorified plug. The portal had to be reopened because K’fhoggnarh and the rest of the Netherworld’s denizens had to evacuate to somewhere…safer. Unfortunately, the people of San Lorenzo had nowhere else to go—and I was here to make sure of that! The sky had turned red, night and day was never the same again, and the seasons have been thrown off balance, with long dry days of summer being followed by downpours of torrential rain, flooding everything on sight.

“But you know what the worst of it all is?” Anyone could have mistaken the tone of his voice as that of a person merely talking about the weather, and not the end of the world. He sneered. “The _earthquakes._ Yes, they were the _worst_. Every day, they increased in frequency, in intensity, in severity…thus the broken buildings, the cracked walls, and all the glorious destruction outside.” He casually, lazily brushed off some imaginary dust off the fur on his shoulder. “I mean, don’t blame my army too much, dear Dulcinea.” He walked to her, each step echoing across this chamber of prisoners, smirking at her all the way.

“We’re not that much of the monstrous, barbaric brutes you think we are.”

Dulcinea clenched her fists. Controlled her emotions. Trapped the angry tears inside, trying her very best to appear strong.

She stared at him levelly, but the question came out of her lips in a trembling hiss.

“How evil are you?”

…at the question, the smirk on his face fell. He was silent for a moment, and it actually looked like he was taking his time processing his answer before he converted them into words. But then…

He booped her on the nose.

She violently recoiled away from his touch because Felina, it _burned!_ Before she tripped over her feet in utter shock, Puss had managed to catch her before she fell.

“Dulcinea…” he gently began, but nothing could stop her because Dulcinea was seething. _Seething_ , and she pushed Puss away from her when she stood up on her own two feet, staring at Evil Puss as defiantly as any offended woman should.

_How dare he!_

“I told you already, sweetheart,” said the chuckling Emperor-King, thoroughly amused of the lady’s outright reaction of disgust of him, “I am _not_ evil. I just don’t let anything get in the way of what I want!”

“And what _do_ you want? Kill us all? Rule the world? Take all the treasure and make yourself the richest person who had ever lived?”

“Pfft, fiddlefuff, none of that,” he said, waving a paw in the air to reject all she said. “Just plain old fashioned revenge.”

And that ticked her off. “ _Revenge?!_ And what did _we_ ever do to _you?!_ ” She was mad. Mad! “San Lorenzo never did anything to you. The children here are innocent _._ And you decided to step on all of us, lock everyone in cages, just because you think the world hated you? Ugh! You listen to me, _mister_ , when I tell you that you are the sickest, most perverted, hollow-minded, twisted little jerk I have ever met in my entire existence, and I have had _enough_ of you!”

Dulcinea didn’t even realize that she’d blindly began to march to him angrily, breathing so heavily it verged on hyperventilation, if Puss hadn’t stepped forward to stop her, extending an arm to fence her away from the said evil maniac.

When silence settled after that, Puss finally took the opportunity to speak.

“We have defeated you in a fair fight, Evil Puss,” said he, the look on his eyes tinged with a plea. And was that…was that gentleness she heard? “You have caused mayhem in our town, robbed me of my identity, and heartlessly attempted to banish me from my own home. You conquered over the Netherworld, and stole the free will of its denizens, just as you are doing to San Lorenzo right now.” Puss lifted his head to face his nemesis levelly, his overshadowed eyes shining a bright green through the darkness.

“And you dare say that _we_ were the ones who did you evil?”

As if what Puss just said was the most hilarious joke he’d ever heard, his evil counterpart burst out laughing for no apparent reason for the third time that day.

It was then that Dulcinea was fully convinced that this maniac was not even mentally sane.

“You,” he began, breathlessly, brokenly, “you summoned K’fhoggnarh.” He had just recovered from his sudden bout of laughter, but there was this sort of hysteria in his voice that almost sounded too sincerely fractured to be simple exaggerated drama. And was that…was that a _tremble_ she heard? “You brought me my greatest defeat and humiliation.” Evil Puss looked like he was standing on the verge, his wide, frantic green eyes adopting a moist sheen of tears— _tears?_ —as he continued on madly in his senseless rampage. “You robbed me of my dignity, honour, and pride. And this, this is all _your_ fault, Puss in Boots. You _forced_ K’fhoggnarh to step on me, to crush me to my death, thereby forcing _me_ to go back to my own homeworld. And you can’t even imagine, because I was humiliated by my own fellowmen _._ You hear me?! I was _humiliated_ , by my very own _fellowmen_ ; banished, exiled, _cast out!_ ”

“But how is that so?” responded a confused Puss, “For you once told me that you were the emperor in your world!” Puss took a step back, as if to thoughtfully analyse the big picture, before clarity descended on him. “ _Ah_. I should have known, then. They were nothing but the poor lies of someone desperate to be adored.”

“I didn’t lie to you about _that_ ,” his counterpart huffed defensively, “I _was_ an emperor. _Was_ , before I was overthrown. But I guess, no matter where you find them…” His gaze had turned inward, his pupils reducing to pinpricks, as he muttered, “…humanity will always be the same deluded mess that it is. Lulling itself into the illusion that there’s such a thing as freedom…”

His words had become a mindless mutter, so he shook his head to clear it of his thoughts. Thoughts that remained a mystery to everyone in the room except himself.

“ _Anyway_ ,” he rebooted, seeming ready to get back to business, “what were we talking about again? Ah, yes, _revenge_ , right? It’s a fun motivation to keep living, you know, you should try it sometime. Forcing your debtors to pay their debts is not evil.” That snaky smirk again. “Wouldn’t you _say_ so, Dulcinea? And please address me ‘Emperor-King’ this time, not that ridiculous nickname you gave me—it’s really starting to get very annoying.”

Dulcinea did no such thing. She narrowed her eyes at him.

“ _Never_ , Evil Puss.”

“Huh.”

He marched to her, his face expressionless. Then—

_Smack._

Dulcinea hit the ground breathless and aghast, struck by traumatizing shock—she had never been slapped on the face like that before.

_“Dulcinea!”_

Artephius, Toby, and Puss’ voices had melded into one with the children’s cries, including Señora Zapata and Mayor Temeroso’s vehement cursing in rapid-fire Spanish from wherever prison they were locked in.

“Enough of that, _laddie_ ,” she even heard Pajuna call out from somewhere to the far left of the chamber, “she never did anything to you!”

The ones nearest to her—Artephius and Toby, even Babieca who whinnied his frantic anxiety—had rushed to her side to support her, ask her gently if she was okay. Puss, however…

He still stood where he was. And he was growling.

Puss knew he wasn’t the one who did it; he was well aware of that. But knowing that this evil monster had used _his_ paw— _his_ _paw_ , the one _he_ used in fighting and punching filthy men—to _smite_ Dulcinea—

—pure, kind-hearted, virtuous, _loving_ Dulcinea—

“How dare you hurt her, you fiendish demon!” He needed his sword. He needed a _fight_. “I will make you pay for this—“

“Fiendish demon?” Evil Puss smirked. It was becoming a really very _really_ infuriating habit of his. “Ah, ah, ah, watch your language there. You are crossing the line now, Puss in _Boots_. Children are watching!”

It was a horrifying thought, that this psycho dared claim he knew _anything_ about crossing lines.

“Crossing the line? Crossing the _line?!_ ” The chains dangled noisily as they hung down his wrist, while he wildly gestured around as if to get his point across. “ _You_ were the one trespassing into territories not yours!”

“And why not? What’s _stopping_ me?” That infuriating smirk widened. “I mean, it’s not like this town was under your protection in the first place.”

“Why can you not just conquer another town from wherever world you came from? You do not _belong_ here in San Lorenzo; you do not belong _anywhere_ in this world!”

“Oh my gods, and you think _you_ do?”

Those last three words eerily ricocheted throughout the suddenly silent chamber, rendering the both of them in a standstill.

After several moments of silence passed, and his archenemy still had nothing of a comeback, Evil Puss sneered, satisfied of the effective punch of his words. Because of course, who _else_ knew where to hit Puss in Boots in the nerve, except his very own self?

He proceeded to walk towards him, each step of his boots hollowly resounding off the walls.

“You see, you and I,” he began, mockingly, conversationally, “We are one and the same. The two halves of the same coin. The yin and the yang. The light and the dark. The strong and…the weak.” He sneered. “We are nomads, free spirits, outlaws. Cast out, forever running.” One last smooth tap of his boot against marble floor, and Emperor-King Puss stood before Puss in Boots.

“You are the _sí_ to my _no_ , Puss in Boots. We’ll never belong anywhere. That’s why…” He gestured at the entire chamber, its gold and its prisoners, its glory and its wickedness, with all the pride of a king. “That’s why we have to build a world that accepts us. A world that doesn’t banish us from our homes.”

Dulcinea could tell that that specific phrase meant something deeper than what it seemed, because she saw Puss clench his fists at that, as if with all his pent-up pain.

“Join me,” hissed Evil Puss right next to his nemesis’ ear, a serpent tempting him with a beautiful sin. “Accept my offer, and you shall never, _ever_ have to run again. Join me, and you will have not only San Lorenzo, but the _world_ at your very feet. I mean…that’s what you want, right? The world’s acceptance and praise? To have everyone exalt you for your greatness, to have everyone sing your name to the heavens, to have everyone fall before you on their knees like a majestic god, to _fear_ you…if they dared?”

Dulcinea had been waiting in bated breath for his answer, so when it came, relief struck her boneless.

“And that, my twin,” the Spaniard feline fencer she knew had said, chuckling lowly, “is where you are wrong.”

“—ish.”

Everybody’s heads whipped around to look at the kid, and all Dulcinea could do was scold him for rudely interrupting.

“Toby…”

“What?” squeaked the pig. “I mean, Puss _likes_ it when we praise him and sing his name and cheer for him and—”

“No! I mean, _yes_ , but that’s not—”

Puss in Boots smiled. “It is alright, Dulcinea. Toby…does have a point. A very acute one. Because though perhaps it is true that I crave the praise and the acceptance, I ascertain that I earn it. Deservingly. Rightfully.” Here he looked at his counterpart directly into the eyes. “That is only one of the many lessons I have learned in San Lorenzo, the one place I could truly call my home, the one place I would gladly lay down my life for should the need arise.

“Since the first day, I have been bound to this town by duty to be its protector. But over time, that title has grown into something more than duty, something even more…binding than duty, something…something that even I have yet to figure out what. But that does not matter,” he continued, shaking his head, and letting his paw fall to the side, not realizing that he’d had it flattened onto his chest in the first place.

“And the only thing that _does_ matter,” he stressed, “is I _will_ take my title as protector of San Lorenzo unto my grave, no matter what happens. And unless I fulfil that one role that gives my existence meaning, I will never truly deserve the title of a hero.” He raised his eyes.

“I therefore implore you. Release every San Lorenzan—” he made sure that his eyes firmly met his enemy’s when he said his next words, the ultimate checkmate of this little game of words—

“and you can have me.”

At that, the San Lorenzans, locked inside their cages, looked to each other, shocked.

Conflicted.

Because if the Emperor-King _did_ comply, and agreed to have them released, what would happen to Puss in Boots, in return for their freedom?

Dulcinea stood up. _No_ , there had to be something else, she was _not_ letting him make any sort of stupid sacrifice, whether it made him a hero or not. She never thought she’d ever be able to have the guts to even _think_ of these words, but she had reached her point:

_To **hell** with heroism!_

“Puss, I want you to _listen_ to me—“

“It is only I you want.” Puss did not even turn to look at her, intent as he was in making this foul bargain. “So take _me!_ Leave the people of San Lorenzo alone! Or, perhaps, even better,” there was suddenly the slightest upward tilt of his mouth, “you could choose to fight me to the death as men do, and I dare you not to refuse this challenge like a coward!”

It was his evil counterpart’s turn to be rendered silent by that.

And then, he began to pace.

For several moments, the entire chamber was filled with nothing but the slight _tap, tap, tap_ of the Emperor-King’s thoughtful pacing, walking back and forth as if to deeply consider his suggestion. So eventually, when he stopped, the words were ready at his mouth.

“You forget, Puss in Boots,” he began slowly, as if carefully filtering it through logic first before letting it out, “that what I want is the perfect revenge on you. I suppose…I suppose your suggestion does have merit. To release the entire town of San Lorenzo, with you as an exchange. Very tempting to say the least. But…as I thought of it…” Seconds. “No.”

Firmly now, “No, I wouldn’t allow it.”

“ _No?!_ ” began an outrageous Puss, “But _—_ “

“Hear me out first, Boots. So you see, revenge actually entails you screaming in pain. But the _perfect_ revenge,” in here he smirked again, his canine-like teeth like the glint of a knife poking against a thoughtful fog, “entails hearing you _begging_ for me to stop hurting your friends, and _then_ hearing you scream in your own pain.”

Relief washed over her. Dulcinea couldn’t describe the feeling, but in a weird way, she felt immensely relieved that the Emperor wouldn’t just take Puss along with him and leave the rest of San Lorenzo worrying about if he’s still alive or not. She surprised herself, not the first time that day, by acknowledging that fact that…that she’d actually rather have every San Lorenzan kept inside their cages, if it meant that Puss will not be taken far away. She felt ridiculously selfish for wanting to spare Puss from any pain at the expense of the rest of San Lorenzo’s freedom—it was a conflicting feeling, one that left her feeling guilty and relieved at the same time—because when exactly was it that she began to subconsciously choose Puss over the rest of San Lorenzo?

“You villainous coward!” said Puss, who advanced towards his enemy and only stopped when a wolf firmly held his chains to trap him in place. “How dare you involve them in this? This fight is between me and you; let them have their freedom, let them out of your pointless warpath, and bring your worst upon only me, for it is what I deserve!”

“Okay, alright.” The Emperor put up a paw in the air to halt him. “I understand that getting them involved must be pretty hard for you to accept. So please, Puss, listen to me, and I’ll make it easier for you.”

He walked towards the cages, extending an arm to gesture at them. “These San Lorenzans? They deserve this. They deserve _all_ these suffering from the first place. Why, you ask? It’s because _they brought it upon themselves_. It’s not as if they shouldn’t have seen this coming—I mean, it’s predictable! Any story that ever involved you would never end up happily, and I know, that just like me, you’ve gone through enough to know this as a fact _._ It’s their fault that they didn’t kick you out of their town while they had the chance, but of course, being the sentimental idiots they are, they decided to keep you in, despite how you _obviously_ brought danger with you everywhere you go. It’s that simple, so there’s no need to blame yourself, buddy. You’re innocent. San Lorenzo, therefore,” finished the Emperor, “is entirely at fault.”

“Please. Do not blame them.” There was defeat in his voice, and it broke Dulcinea’s heart to hear it. “I am…I am the only one to blame.”

The Emperor-King shrugged. “Well, okay, if that’s the thought that makes it easier for you, why not. Because, oh yes, after all, weren’t _you_ the one who brought this fate upon them? Weren’t _you_ the one who broke their protective spell in the first place? Weren’t _you_ the reason why the Blind King decided to take his revenge on an innocent little town, which shouldn’t even be involved? Yes, yes, ask these questions to yourself before you go to sleep tonight, Puss in Boots, and I want you to _think_ on it, think on it as hard as you could, until you fully realize this sad, sad truth.”

He stepped in front of him, painfully gripped him by the shoulders, and neared his face to him so that he could hiss the words out with as much vehemence as he liked.

“San Lorenzo fell because of you. San Lorenzo _suffers_ because of you. I don’t know what kind of delusion you’ve been keeping yourself in this entire time, but San Lorenzo _never_ loved you, and the only reason they even kept you around is because you owe them a debt. You never belonged here, you deserve to be cast out—and you should _never have even come here in the first place_. But alas,” he said, voice falling into a whisper, tinged with so much sorrow that his mockery seemed to border too much on truth, “that one crucial mistake can never be undone now.”

The Emperor-King smiled, and then slowly released Puss in Boots from his deathly grip.

He turned. “ _Guards!_ ”

At his call, several wolves stepped forward from the flanks. “Yes, your, erm, brilliant excellency?”

The Emperor began to walk away from him and towards the doors.

“Show the prisoners their bedrooms, will you,” he lazily commanded. When he passed by Dulcinea, he stopped, looked her up and down, considered, then arched a brow, smirking flirtatiously. “But of course, if my lady wishes to come to mine instead….”

 _Unbelievable jerk._ Dulcinea defiantly crossed her arms over her chest and glared him down. She’d rather _live_ in a prison than be anywhere near this evil little thing.

He simply shrugged the rejection away. “Well, it’s your choice. It’s been a joy chatting with all you nice folks, but an emperor-king is a very busy man indeed.” A wolf had opened the gigantic doors for him, and with the light of the moon outside, shining brightly from behind him, the Emperor-King’s black silhouette fell long onto the marble floors, his shadow falling over just where Puss stood—whose back was turned to him and everyone else, his form unmoving, his fists clenched.

His evil counterpart smirked at that sight, and Dulcinea was left wondering what his world had done to this man that made him such a sad, sad creature.

“I hope you all…sleep _tight_.”

And then the doors closed, cloaking every San Lorenzan held prisoner inside their own treasure house in utter darkness.


	5. Resistance

Each of the torches were then lit by the fiery blue light of the wolf guards’ spears, washing the dark chamber of San Lorenzo’s imprisoned treasures into a phantasmal glow. Even for all the magic she’d seen in her suddenly very eventful life, Dulcinea found it odd for a moment why the flames on the tip of the wolves’ spears were blue—those weapons seemed…familiar somehow.

Until she was yanked out of her musings when a wolf had tugged onto the chain on her neck, and she realized that she was being dragged to her respective cage. Eventually they reached it, and she was thrown by the neck and she landed flat on her front with a hurt _oomf!_ She had the urge to suddenly get up and lecture her warden with a rhyme—“Even when with your greatest foes, treating them nicely is how it goes!”—but it was when she saw the others that she suddenly can’t seem to gather the wisdom of Andante’s book.

Toby was being manhandled by several wolves, all while being laughed at as they made fun of him with crude jokes. All while he can’t defend himself, secondarily because he was cuffed and chained…and mainly because he couldn’t seem to understand what they were laughing about in the first place. He didn’t seem to think that they meant it as a cruel joke when a wolf growled viciously, “I’d _looove_ to eat some sweet, fat pork today!”

“Oh, me too, me too! Eating’s my favourite thing to do, too!”

They burst out laughing, leaving Toby utterly confused about what was suddenly so very funny.

And she wished Artephius would stop acting obliviously. She considered, though, that perhaps a better way for him to cope with this was with a not-exactly-sane-mind. He was still babbling about his stolen popcorn when the wolves threw him in a cage beside the Duchess—who cried tears of joy through the bars that held her inside, her hands reaching out for her dearest Arty, with the old mage saying, “Duchy! Oh hoo hoo _right_ , it all seems just like yesterday, doesn’t it? Oh, wait…it _is_ just yesterday…”

“ _Arty!_ It’s been an _entire_ _year!_ ”

And Puss?

He didn’t seem bothered by all this, if that suddenly wide smile on his face was any indication. _And_ —she thought with a shudder— _that crazy look in his eyes_. That look raised multiple red warning flags to Dulcinea if anything else, because that crazy, smiling look signalled that he was thinking of something so _stupid_ , that, not for the first time, would make her question Puss’ mental stability.

“Lock me up, wolves!” he was saying, raising his cuffed paws to the towering canines, willingly giving himself up to the dogs he so despised. With all the power in his voice, he announced his sacrifice proudly for everybody to hear: “I hereby demand you! _Bring me to the filthiest cage of San Lorenzo!_ ”

Definitely not what the mentally stable would say.

“Don’t you worry, cat,” sneered the alpha wolf, revealing all his wicked sharp teeth before tugging on his chains to lead him away from the rest of them. “The Emperor-King has been preparing your rotten prisoner for this _very_ special day.”

“Ah, _excelente_ ,” he exclaimed, puffing out his chest as if being locked in an especially filthy cage was a much nobler privilege than being hailed as the San Lorenzan of the Year. “Once again I have proven that no one can resist giving only the extremes for the irresistible, the one and only, Puss… _in Boots!_ ”

She just wished he could hear what he was saying right now because she was right about to explode, feeling like, out of everyone else, _she was the only one who remained sane_ —and therefore was the only one who took the blows of reality in full force. She got up from the cold metal ground and attempted to run to him, just as the wolf had slammed the bars of her cage shut, trapping her in.

“ _Puss!_ ” she called out, her paws gripping at the bars, willing that he’d turn around and _look_ at her.

He didn’t. His head was raised high, seeming very much unburdened by the chains around his neck even as he was being pulled away from them all.

“Do not cry for me, Dulcinea. For this,” he said, with all the infernal nobility of a sacrificial lamb, “is what I deserve!”

She angrily pounded on the bars of her prison, until the light of an idea sparked in her mind. She glared up at the alpha wolf and demanded, “Then get me out of here—I want that cage too!”

“Ooh, me too! Me too!” jumped in Toby, “I wanna be where Puss stays, like real best friends do!”

“Really? Best friends do that? Then count me in!”

“ _Arty!_ You’ll stay here with me!”

“Oh, right.”

The alpha wolf halted in his tracks to turn around and look at Dulcinea with amused incredulity. Dulcinea stared at him just as defiantly.

“I,” she said, “want you,” firmly, “to bring me,” _unwaveringly_ —

“where Puss stays.”

There was a brief pause. Everyone stared at her as if she herself had gone mad.

Until Puss laughed so hard she was afraid that he just might start coughing up his innards.

“ _Ha!_ Do not be so estupid, Dulcinea! You having to suffer for my sins makes no sense at all! Perhaps you are…” his voice had dropped to a stage whisper, still with that infuriating smile plastered on his face, “injured in the head? You can tell me. Hmm? Hmm?”

Artephius. “Wait, what? Are you talking about me?”

Dulcinea fought the urge to palm at her face, but didn’t quite succeed at keeping that growl from her voice. “Puss, are you even _listening_ to what you’re saying? You’re the one who wants the filthiest cage for yourself!”

“That is because I deserve it! End of discussion! Good day to you!” He turned from her one last time and walked away so rebelliously as if he despised the very ground. The alpha wolf shrugged, made cuckoo gestures with his friends, and led his prisoner away.

Until they all heard Babieca’s agonized whinny.

“Come on, you filthy horse!” a wolf was shouting, who, along with others, had cornered the anxious stallion and was frightening him with each time he lashed his whip, cracking at the air and filling it with threat. “Move! Out you go! _MOVE!_ ”

The stallion bucked and violently whinnied his distress, his eyes wide with alarm at the whip and the various other instruments all the others held in their paws. Babieca’s very master had trained him with love and understanding, and only a true horseman could accomplish such mastery without these crude, barbaric tools! They had been trying to pull him out of the treasure house, tugging harshly at the chains they’d wrapped around his neck, but apparently Babieca hadn’t wanted to leave.

There was anger and honest bewilderment at Puss’ gasp. “How dare you, señor, threat to flog my noble steed! Being flogged is what _I_ deserve! And unless you understand this,” Puss easily unlocked the cuffs from his wrists with a click of his claws, and the chains fell around at his feet. “I fight you! Ha!”

He leapt into the air and kicked at the nose of the nearest wolf right beside him, causing him to stagger for a few seconds and fall to the ground, unconscious. Puss grabbed at the chains and began to circle around the alpha wolf, and it was just when he was in the middle of saying “Hey! What are you—” when suddenly, with a powerful tug, Puss had him flat on his face.

Dulcinea so desperately wanted to help, but all she could do trapped in her cage was yell. “Puss! Watch out!”

Puss drew out his claws, and with a very predatory feline hiss, he turned to attack at one of the three wolves that had been quietly advancing at him from behind, leaping into the air to scratch at his face and then snatching his spear to spin it in the air and _shot_ _it_ —the wolves frantically went out in their way to dodge it, unless, of course, they wanted a spear shooting through their skulls. The sharp end of the spear had instead hit a vase, but before Puss could gloat at the preciseness of his attack, he’d sensed someone else coming from behind him and he quickly turned to punch him, and used the poor wolf’s fury head as leverage to launch himself into a pack of waiting wolves, all their spears at the ready.

It was when the tips of the spears began to glow an eerie blue light that Dulcinea suddenly remembered at last where she’d last seen those kinds of weapons—

_The Mole King and his army!_

The…Mole King and his army?

No time for speculations now. “Puss, don’t! Those spears are—”

Too late. One of them had already launched a surge of pure blue energy, hitting Puss right at the chest and sending him flying across the air until his back hit a pillar, from where he sagged back down to the ground, groaning in pain.

The entire chamber might have just erupted in desperate cries at that. And just when they were starting to have the slightest hope that they had the slightest fighting chance…

_“Puss!”_

Puss attempted to get up, and from the look on his eyes, he even seemed like he still intended to fight despite his beaten state. But once the alpha wolf had stepped ominously before him, and he’d grabbed at his face so he could look directly into those green eyes—

“Seriously, Bootsie,” mocked the alpha, “I thought you thought fighting is pointless now. You’re stupid not to know that you’ll only _lose_.”

He gestured at the entire grinning wolf army from behind him to show him his point. Puss jerked his head away from the alpha’s hold and looked away.

“I _will_ stop fighting,” he said, getting up from the floor as he held his aching arm with a paw, breathless and clearly trying to mask some hidden pain, “only if you promise never to hurt Babieca. Else, I would fight until I kill myself, and I am certain that your beloved Emperor would punish you for letting that happen to your finest prisoner.”

The alpha wolf was dumbstruck by that. As well as Dulcinea and the rest of the San Lorenzans watching from their cages.

Why did Puss seem to be so sacrificial at everything all of a sudden?

The alpha seemed to give it up, frustratedly running a paw down his face. He then commanded, “Sarge! Give him your word so we could get this lousy show over with!”

The wolf named ‘Sarge’ dropped his whip down the ground and raised his paws up in the air, rolling his eyes at the role he was playing in this ridiculous farce. “Alright, alright, _fine_. I promise I won’t hit your precious horse again. Ugh,” he said, turning to his comrades, “Let’s go guys, before this show gets any weirder.”

Sarge and a bunch of his other assistance tugged on Babieca’s chains to lead the stallion outside, possibly to be kept at the stables. Once the door had shut close did Puss speak again.

“Ah. Then all is settled! You can rest easy now, everybody!” Puss held his arms out again to the alpha in surrender, as if asking to be cuffed once more. “Please let us resume to our earlier state of affairs. Bring me to the filthiest cage, for surely I cannot refuse such an honour!”

Shrugging at each other and muttering variants of the phrase _deluded idiot_ under their breaths, the wolves took Puss again, locking his wrists with cuffs and chaining him around the neck, before they began to tug at him, and walk him away.

Dulcinea couldn’t believe this was happening. Once, she’d thought that simply giving up wasn’t like him, but now she was convinced that sinking into himself was _definitely_ more like him. She now saw that with Puss at his best, they definitely had the fighting chance here—together with the rest of San Lorenzo. If she could just stop him from falling deep down into the depths of his own despair, if she could just convince him that they had a fighting chance, if he would just listen, if they would just let her be with him in whatever cage they were about to lock him in…

The wolves had opened a secret compartment—the one that led to the Obelisk of Night—and they then threw Puss down the hole, landing on what Dulcinea thought sounded like a metal floor. Of maybe a prepared cage? Be that as it may, but she heard him say, his voice muffled: “I am alright! Ow…my back…”

 _“Puss!_ Now, you lousy creatures!” She pounded on the bars of her prison, “You don’t just _throw_ people around! That’s extremely rude! I will have to tell you that you’ve made me very mad, and I—”

A rapping sound from the metal ceiling of her cage startled her and effectively cut the string of words from her mouth.

“ _Shut up!_ Go to sleep!”

“But _you—!_ ”

“Don’t fight them, Dulcinea,” said Pajuna’s voice, and when Dulcinea squinted in the darkness, she saw the usually ecstatic and busy cow looking dejected and purposeless, overcome by the shadows. “We’ve already tried. Just…just go to sleep.”

* * *

Dulcinea tried. She really did. But despite all the exhaustion she’d pushed upon her body since the night she and the gang had launched themselves into the Netherworldian portal to battle the Blind King and his army, her body just couldn’t seem to _want_ to rest. She tossed and turned as the night went by, until she grew tired enough of trying to sleep that she just threw away the notion of rest and began to think instead.

 _Think, think_ , she told herself, getting up from the cold metal floor to pace in match to her thoughts. _There must be some way to be able to escape from here. But how?_

She went to the bars of her cage and looked up to see that her guard had just started to snore, his body leaning against the length of his spear. And when she looked around, she noticed that all the others had just begun to snore as well, including the children. Something flared within her when she saw them sleeping through the cold night without their blankets—especially Esme, who noticeably shivered as she was hummed to sleep by Señora Zapata’s gentle, sleepy lullaby.

She turned her focus back on the wolves. She recalled this one fact that she’d read from one of her books: wolves were nocturnal, alive during the night, and dead during the day. With all the darkness inside the treasure house, it had been impossible for Dulcinea to tell just how much time had passed, and it was at least good to know that it must be nearing morning time, judging how these wolves had just begun to sleep.

She looked at the lock on her cage, then drew out her own claws. She’d seen Puss numerous times use his own claws to pick on locks, and while she can’t say that she knew how to do it herself, she _can_ say that it was worth a try. She’d never picked on locks before—the need had never risen, but now she found herself regretting not having asked Puss to teach her some of the seemingly endless things he knew about fighting and stuff like this. It made her wonder just how life had been to Puss before he landed on San Lorenzo…

And just as she thought she’d heard something _click_ inside the lock, her wolf guard shot his eyes open.

Dulcinea covered her mouth to keep a gasp from coming through.

Then after she let moments of silence pass, the wolf went right back to sleep, muttering something about wanting five minutes more before he got up for school.

 _Phew_.

She went right back to work on her lock. But just as soon as she did, a voice suddenly broke through her thoughts, nearly so making her scream.

“Shh! Shh! It’s alright, lassie, it’s just me!”

“P-Pajuna?” She nearly sagged to the floor in relief that it wasn’t Evil Puss suddenly walking in and catching her in the middle of her albeit pathetic attempts of escaping.

“Yes!” the cow whisper-screamed. “What do you _think_ are you doing?”

“…escaping?” She wasn’t sure what to make of Pajuna’s question. “Isn’t that what we’re supposed to be doing?”

“What the girl says,” sighed a dejected Mayor Temeroso. “Getting out of here is just as easy as getting bitten by the wolves.”

Now that struck her as odd. “Uh…Mayor? You aren’t…afraid of the wolves?” Not that she wanted him to be afraid of them, but…

“Well,” smiled the Mayor through the darkness, “the good thing about being held prisoner in a den of wolves for years is that I’m no longer afraid of anything.”

“Oh, really? Yay!” Oh, _finally_ someone here knew how to bring such good spirits! “But…but why?”

He looked at her. “Because death would be a blessing.”

…yikes.

“But there has to be some way to get out of here!” she hissed, careful not to make her voice any louder than she was already making it. She wanted every San Lorenzan from every corner to be roused from their slumber and shake them awake, because this was their town, and they had to fight for it! They simply just can’t give up!

“Look, Dulcinea,” piped in Señora Zapata, “We’ve tried everything we could, but things only ended up the same way.”

“I broke my leg one time we tried to escape!” said Señor Igualdemontijo.

“And I broke an arm!” exclaimed Señora Igualdemontijo.

“The wolves tried to bite my butt!” added Eames, “And they did! It kinda still hurts…”

“And they turned the sky red!” said Puss Dos. “Poor sky.”

“And they smashed my pickle jar! I ain’t Kid Pickles without no pickles!”

“And did you know that Cleevil and I almost escaped, but did you know Evil Puss tried to hurt us using his swordy stuff on our way out and tried to kill us?”

“And he tore my Mister Cubbie in half!” Esme sniffed and then burst into tears, hugging Señora Zapata tightly just as the Señora passionately embraced her back. And Dulcinea now saw that the teddy bear’s neck had been ripped, with the stuffing pouring out like white foam—and poor stitching was the only thing that even kept the head attached to its body.

Mutters began to spread in the chamber, and she was suddenly afraid that she’d roused them the wrong way.

“Now, now, kids…I promise you, everything will be alright…”

“No, it wouldn’t!” screamed Cleevil, so brokenly that it surprised Dulcinea how she’d even identified that as broken in the first place when Cleevil’s voice had always seemed rough around the edges. “The other adults here already promised us that! But obviously _none of you_ can get us out of these creepy cages!”

“And we cannot just simply unlock these cages and fight the wolves,” said the Duchess, who, Dulcinea noticed, had went out of her way to stick her hand out of the bars of her cage to grip at Artephius’. A bout of strong feeling for a…certain someone…shot through her as she watched the two of them freely hold each other despite being caged—they were a couple through and through. “There are too many of them, and too less of us!”

“And Evil Puss?” pitched in Eames. "He’s the undefeatable big bad boss. At first, the San Lorenzans wanted to use me to defeat him. I mean, he appointed me as his, like, his royal adviser—and I was his bestest friend! But…to be honest, he’s far more intelligent than the Puss I’m used to. He found me out even if I wasn’t even in the middle of our plan, and threw me in this cage along with everybody else once he did. Not a one of us here can fight him one-on-one— I mean, he’s got that killer alpha wolf as his bodyguard, so that’s that.”

“The _point_ Eadwig is trying to make here,” began the Duchess.

“Ugh! It’s Eames! _Eames!_ ”

“Whatever! Your name sounds like skin infection! _Anyway_ ,” sighed the Duchess, “so the point is, if we have to get out here, we have to go through Evil Puss first!”

“Because Evil Puss commands the wolves,” continued Pajuna. “And we all know that wolves, being the loyal dogs they are, only move at the command of their master.”

“So,” added Señora Zapata, “if we take out Evil Puss…”

“Then we take out the rest of his army,” finished a transfixed Dulcinea. “You’re right, everybody! We just have to defeat Evil Puss!”

“And that’s, like, just impossible, girl,” said Sphinx, and it startled Dulcinea that she hadn’t even noticed another cat’s presence up until now. “Believe me, we’ve tried. At the first sign that we’re even trying to escape, and one of these wolf dudes would wake up, they’d, like, howl. Ugh, I hate dogs. And, like, their barbaric howling noises. _So_ not classy, girl.”

“They’d howl, like the vicious animals they are!” continued the Duchess. “Warning every other wolf in the entire town! And the pests would swarm us before we even got the chance to step out of this dreaded treasure house! Ever since then, Evil Puss had taken every measure to prevent us from escaping—he’d drained me of my magic!”

“And, like, every one of our strengths.”

“And willpower!”

“And no one can get to him, lassie,” said Pajuna. “Even if we made it past the howling wolves, he’s got a whole bunch of wolf bodyguards, and unless someone here wants to risk becoming wolf chow…”

It seemed that everybody cringed at the mental image.

“No, no, everybody,” pacified Dulcinea, “we just have to keep brainstorming! How about …” Think, Dulcinea, _think_.

Aha! The Mole King and his army!

“How about the Mole King and his army? Surely they could come and help us? Surely they’d help us outnumber the wolves?”

“Nope, already tried that,” cut off Sphinx, who was looking at her nails and scowling at them. “And failed.”

“Ugh,” grumped Zapata, “They were driven away from San Lorenzo by the wolves after we tried negotiating with them. Filthy traitors!”

“Huh? Then why are the wolves wielding the Moles’ spears?”

“That’s because the weapons they’re holding _are_ the Moles’ spears,” explained Temeroso. “They gave up their armoury in exchange for their freedom.”

Dulcinea was silent after that.

“Do you now see,” Temeroso smiled painfully, poking through the silence, “how hopeless our situation is?”

Dulcinea shook her head, not wanting to let all this negativity get through to her. “No matter. We don’t need the moles. San Lorenzo is enough of an army. We’ll just need a fighting spirit!”

“They _outnumber_ us, Dulcinea,” sighed the Duchess exasperatedly. “I don’t know how to make that any clearer for you!”

Dulcinea clenched her fists. “So, what, just because they outnumber us for a bit, you’re all just _giving up?_ ”

“What else could we do?” grumped Kid Pickles, who, without his pickles, seemed very grumpy indeed. “In case you haven’t heard already, lady, we’ve already tried escaping a buncha times; and in every single one of ‘em, we _lost_ , and a lotta somebodies just get hurt along the way before we get chucked back into these cages.  It’s pointless! Unless you got any other option other than rotting in our prisons for the rest of eternity?”

She breathed in, closed her eyes. Then opened them again.

“We try again.”

Careful though they were not to wake up the sleeping wolves, mumblings rippled out the entire chamber once more, each one either shaking their head dejectedly or tentatively letting themselves to feel the tiniest drop of hope that maybe, just maybe…Dulcinea was right.

Pajuna had crossed her arms over her chest and was looking at Dulcinea. “Lassie…”

“No.” She stated this word firmly. “This time, I promise you, it’s going to be different. You’re not as outnumbered as before anymore, because this time…” She let her eyes roam over to the spot where the hole on the floor that led down to the obelisk was. “This time we have Puss.”

“Ha!” snorted a mocking Señora Zapata, “And what could that miserable cat in shoes do? You all saw what he was like today. He even seems like he’s the only one of us who actually _likes_ to be locked up.”

“He’s the only one who knows how to actually fight Evil Puss,” Dulcinea defended. “He’s the only one who could fight him, because he’s himself! He knows all of his strengths and his weaknesses, Señora Zapata, why are you being so mean to him? We _need_ Puss if San Lorenzo wants its freedom back!”

“No! We can’t do that!” interrupted a Mayor Temeroso, his voice bordering on desperate. “If we even try to get out, the wolves will chase us, Dulcinea! And I’m scared of wolves! …Also kites, and white glue, and hiccups and small rocks…yogurt?”

Dulcinea smiled. If Mayor Temeroso felt scared again…then he felt the need to survive.

“Yes, we can! Sure, Puss seems a bit…fragile at the moment, but that’s just because he feels like he’s the one to blame for everything that’s happened. And we’re going to have to help him out of it!”

“No!” Heads turned to Señora Zapata, who had her arms crossed in a way that was uniquely Señora Zapata. “Let him dwell in his own mistakes, because he _is_ the one to blame! If only he hadn’t broken the spell that concealed San Lorenzo in the first place—”

“And he’s done everything he could to protect us from every thief, every evil that threatened our town,” parried Dulcinea, the words coming as easily from her heart as breathing. “Don’t you think that maybe it’s _our_ turn now to save _him?_ ”

She let that sink in as everybody else guiltily turned their heads to look away or face the ground, because in a way, they themselves knew the truth of her words. Puss in Boots was in every way the mischievous troublemaker, bringing dragons and mermaids and pirates and skeletons and sky gods in their town, very nearly setting it on fire for countless of times—but one thing cannot be denied. He was the one who opened them to a world full of thrill; he was the one that opened every day like a book with a brand new story waiting to be unravelled; he was an adventure written into each and every one of their hearts, and losing that adventure into memory was something they couldn’t just easily accept anymore. No, because they’d become too attached, he’d already become one of them, and with each passing day, it had become more and more difficult for Dulcinea to even think of what life would have been if Puss didn’t follow her to San Lorenzo on that faithful first day they’d met at the Thieves’ Market.

No, San Lorenzo couldn’t be that San Lorenzo anymore without Puss in Boots in it. If San Lorenzo was anything, it was that it was a family…and family never abandoned each other, they _loved_ each other, no matter their flaws.

The sound of hooves clapping interrupted everyone else’s musings, and all heads turned to Pajuna.

“Well said, lassie,” said the cow, who revealed that she had a key—three keys— _five_ keys?—she’d been hiding in one of the pockets of her skirt. “Maybe we’ll try out escaping…just this one more time.”

Dulcinea looked like she was the only one who was surprised at the fact that Pajuna even _had_ keys. It can’t be denied that she’d missed a lot of interesting things while they’d been away.

“But Pajuna…how did you…?”

“Eh, I once worked as a larcenist.” It sometimes amazed her just how much Pajuna and Puss had so much in common when it came to having vaguely deep pasts. “And being imprisoned is boring enough without a hobby.”

When a wolf shifted from his sleep and mumbled something incoherent, everyone froze, dreading him to wake up. Thankfully he stopped his mumbling and went back to sleep. Everyone released their sighs of relief, because now, like the Mayor Temeroso, they’d suddenly regained their lost feelings and banished the numbness from their nerves—replacing it with something akin to excitement, to anticipation.

To hope.

Because maybe, Dulcinea was right.

Maybe, this time, the town of San Lorenzo had a fighting chance.

And maybe, their Puss in Boots _could_ beat the Evil Emperor once and for all.

“Now, lassie,” whispered a determined Pajuna. “What’s this plan of yours?”

As Dulcinea began to talk, everybody inched forward to hear what she had to say.


	6. Out of the Cage

Planning their grand escape took them the rest of the wee hours of the morning, and they had to stop and pretend they were innocently sound asleep when the wolves began to get up from their deep slumber, yawning and then suddenly standing guard and pretending they had been awake all night when they heard the doors being unlocked from the outside. The Emperor-King waltzed into the chamber with all the haughtiness of the world, bringing in a lot of sunlight pouring from the outside to fill the room with his blinding arrogance, smirking and strutting like he was walking down an aisle where everybody adored him.

It was, of course, the exact opposite. As he passed the cage of every San Lorenzan—“Duchess?” “Present.” “Mister funny-looking old man?” “Please! Mister funny-looking old man is my father!” “Sphinx?” “Here, dude.” “Zapata?” “Dreaming about how to kill you, you despicable cat!” “Cow lady?” “Go to hell.” “Fat San Lorenzan with the hat?” “Present!”—the ominous tap-tapping of the Evil Emperor’s boots grew ever louder, and the fact that she could actually hear him approach her slowly, tauntingly, was torture.

The tedious roll call was interrupted by Esme.

“Mister Cubbie wants to go to potty!”

The self-proclaimed Emperor didn’t even need to demand an explanation. Groaning and dragging a palm down his face, he gestured for two of his wolves to escort her and Zapata out of their cages to wherever the potty was.

After the doors closed, the roll call continued. Until he approached the last cage…

Hers.

She just sat where she sat, staring up at him when he approached. She made sure not to divert her eye-contact, wanting to establish to him that she was not the type to cower before evil—whether that evil being took the form of an emperor or not.

He didn’t say anything. He just approached her cage and examined it, paws clasped behind his back, his eyes thoughtfully scanning over the locks, and touching them occasionally as if to check on some minute detail that he didn’t want to miss.

What _was_ he checking on, anyway?

“Ah,” he said, smirking as he took a step back from the cage to finally take a look at her. “So you have tried to tamper with the locks of your cage, Miss Dulcinea. Naughty, naughty, naughty. Didn’t you know that pets are supposed to be kept inside their cages? Imagine how lonely your master would be if he found out you’re gone in the morning.”

She felt the skin under her fur blush.

“But,” he said, “I will forgive you for trying to betray me, my lady. Because today, I’m in an _extremely_ cheerful mood.” And indeed, a wide smile conquered his face, as if he himself had conquered another land for his empire. “Tonight, Dulcinea, will be a night of triumph! We shall stand in front of the altar, and then, under the light of the moon…” He neared his face to the bars of the cages to glare at her, his green eyes glittering brightly when ominous shadows fell on them.

“We will be husband and wife.”

The words were a blow. Her eyes widened, and the fists that she hadn’t even realized had been clenching on her skirt loosened their hold, her whole body taken over with shock.

_“What?”_

“We’re getting _married_ tonight, Dulcinea!” he repeated with much glee. Much, much one-sided glee. “Aren’t you just _excited?_ ”

The horror that clenched her heart forced the words out of her.

“And what if I say no, you evil creature?!”

“ _Oh_ , silly girl, you _can’t_.” He strutted back and threw his arms out, grandly gesturing at all the treasure house’s gold and jewels and magical fiddlefuff. “Because this marriage is going to happen, whether you like it or not! This is a crucial part of my plan for the perfect revenge on Puss, you see. We’re just going to tie him up a pole and decorate him with flowers and whatnot, like a real altar. And then, that way…” He walked back to her cage and banged onto the bars of her prison, startling Dulcinea and backing her into a corner as he continued on his mindless rampage.

“That way, oh, _that_ way, he’ll be able to witness first-hand how I’d take you as _mine_ , him writhing in his own jealousy as I forcibly _take_ your lovely lips, all while he could do _nothing_ about it, as helpless as a pathetic mouse trapped by a real man of a cat. This is just the first part of my perfect revenge, my sweet. Nothing personal. And I want to begin it with you as my Empress-Queen…so he aches in the pain of your betrayal in every step of the way.”

It had taken her every ounce of her willpower to deflect his vile, disgusting words so they’d never get to her, but alas, each word was a sharp stab and they penetrated her defences and twisted her bones from the inside; and she was barely able to keep her tears within.

This evil was perverted.

“Never,” she managed to bite out, her voice trembling as she cowered in the corner from this monstrosity. “I will never marry you, Evil Puss, and nothing you say can make me love you enough to do so!”

He blinked. Until he let the meaning of her words sink in.

“Oh, _no_.” Evil Puss knelt closer to where she was, and struck his paw right through the bars of the cage to grab at her chin so tightly, he nearly choked her. She heard her name being called out by her friends, but what else could they do but scream from behind their own bars?

“Oh, no no no no _no_ , mademoiselle,” he chided, and Dulcinea’s blood froze into solid ice when the slightest tinge of red came to taint his very eyes, “I command this relationship. And tsk- _tsk_ , it’s not about _love_ , my gullible Dulcinea…it’s about control. Authority. _Power_. You are nothing but my submissive wife, trembling in fear before her dominating husband! You don’t have a _choi_ —“

“Your highness!”

His eye twitched. The red glow vanished, leaving his bright green orbs back to what they had once been, like the whole thing had been nothing but a figment of her imagination. He turned to look at the reporting wolf, but his grip hadn’t loosened from her chin and she was beginning to think it might leave a bruise.

“Yes? Can’t you see I’m in the middle of something here?”

“Your highness, it’s important! A distress call came from our troupes in Empire Nine—they said they need you there, _urgently_ , my Emperor-King!”

He finally let go of her chin, and Dulcinea fell on all fours, breathless and panting.

“Can’t it _wait_ until tomorrow evening?” he complained.

“It can’t, sire! The rebels have emerged, and if you don’t come they might overthrow you from the—“

“Oh, _fine_.” He got up from his knee, and he looked at Dulcinea before leaving. “We are not done here, girl. As soon as I return…” He grabbed at one of her paws and touched his lips on it. “I _will_ be marrying you.”

Dulcinea snatched her paw away from him and backed to a corner as far away from him as possible. Her blood-shot eyes followed him as he strutted out of the treasure house, and suddenly, from out of nowhere, just as he stepped out that door, before she could stop the words from rushing out of her mouth—

“I hope the rebels kill you.”

The Evil Emperor simply turned to look at her. And smirk.

“I’ve been handling thirteen empires, sweetheart, and each has tried and failed in their pathetic attempts at what they call their revolutions.” Then he tipped his hat in adios. “I will see you in less than a day or two then, mademoiselle. Ah, no, he’s Spanish…he calls you señorita, doesn’t he? …Well then, _señorita_ ,” he caressed that single word with a rough chuckle, “before I bid you farewell, can I do something to make you feel more…comfortable while I am away?”

“How about you free San Lorenzo?!”

“Nothing? Okay. Suit yourself. Just tell the wolves if you need anything, they’d howl to get the rest of the town to…accommodate.” He winked. “…your special needs.”

It made her sick that she was the one being offered comfort, and not the rest of the San Lorenzans who had clearly been suffering for months in their cages. Convinced that anything that came from him was vile, she wanted to turn his offer down and _slam_ it on his face, and _hard_ , just for the fun of it.

But…

“W-wait!” she said, before Evil Puss could completely step out into the sun and leave them all in the darkness again. He turned and looked at her expectantly, and Dulcinea fidgeted on with her fingers, not really certain how to phrase it.

“I…can you…” She cleared her throat.

He was staring.

_No time to act like his intense stare intimidated her!_

“All the children sleep without blankets,” she finally blurted. “Could you…provide blankets for them? Please?”

The Evil Emperor’s intelligent eyes narrowed at her then, and for a moment Dulcinea feared he may see her ulterior motive and never acquiesce.

“…of course,” he said, cautiously. “They shall all be delivered to you in no time.”

Her heart could have jumped at joy at that, but she let no emotion pass through her exterior as she simply stared at him and nodded.

“…thank you.”

He tipped his hat with a devious smirk. “You’re very welcome.”

And once the doors closed, she sagged onto the floor, and rested her back against the bars. Dealing with that man tired her out.

Or maybe it was because she hadn’t had any proper sleep yet since she’d launched herself into the portal to the Netherworld.

“That cat is _gross!_ ”  began Cleevil.

“And did you know that I agree and think he’s grosser than Esme’s potty?” asked Vina.

“Yeah! Even Mister Cubbie says that he’s eviler than any villain we’ve ever met!” agreed Esme, who had just returned from her morning potty.

“He is soooo _annoying_ , he makes me want to vomit all the food I ate! Obviously,” added Toby, “ _our_ Puss in Boots is so much better than that…that…”

_“That good-for-nothing little turd!”_

“Kid Pickles!” chided Dulcinea. “Watch your language, please!”

“Oh, for heavens’ sakes,” said the Duchess, “it’s perfectly merited right now, Dulcinea!”

“And, wait a moment here,” added Pajuna, “did you actually just _thank_ Evil Puss? That guy doesn’t deserve the teeniest ounce of gratitude—much less from you! Don’t tell me…” and here the cow crossed her arms, clearly remembering that one ‘accidental’ incident that she actually blurted about how _handsome_ and _charming_ Evil Puss was.

“…that you actually _want_ to marry him?”

“ _Gasp!_ ” gasped Artephius, who scrambled into a corner to point at Dulcinea as if she’d just gone mad. “She’s turned crazier than me!”

Her insides churned. That they’d think _that_ of her?

“No! No, I—“

“ _Don’t_ listen to Evil Puss, Dulcinea!” advised Señora Zapata, and with such passion and vehemence that she could’ve been mistaken for a theatre actress. “Do _not_ fall for his sweet, sweet lies! Men like him—oh, they would use you, they would hurt you, and when you would cook fried eggs for his breakfast, he would always complain and tell you he prefers them hardboiled, and _then_ when you cook it hardboiled, he wants it _fried_ , and then leave you crying in your sorrows forever and never even look back!”

Everybody else stared at the Señora, who looked like she was in the midst of strangling the innocent air. She cleared her throat when she noticed that everything had gone silent.

“I have…heard that…from a friend…who is definitely _not me_.”

“Oh my, everyone,” said Dulcinea, steering the conversation back on course. “No, no, I thanked him because…”

 _Because we need to keep his guard down_ , her eyes communicated to all the adults, careful not to reveal anything of their intentions to the wolves’ listening ears. Her stare lingered especially on Pajuna, who understood her the most—after all the time they’d spent together with her either reading a book in the cantina and the cow striking a conversation with her every now and then.

 _We need to keep his guard down,_ she thought to herself, _the wolves asleep during the early hours of morning. If he even suspects that we have a plan, he’s going to heighten the security, and that way our plan would never be able to work._

“…because that’s good manners!” she finished, clapping her hands. “Always remember that, okay, children?”

While every other adult in the treasure house seemed to have understood her intent, silent stare, Artephius decided then to pipe up.

“Huh! That makes even less sense! Wait…” Well, he wasn’t much of an adult. “Does it?”

“And I don’t _want_ to marry Evil Puss,” she continued, her voice quieter this time. She forced her tears back— _you are nothing but my submissive wife, trembling in fear before her dominating husband!_ —and smiled, putting the pads of her paws together as if that would keep her crumbling emotions within.

“He’s… evil. Beyond compare.”

She can’t believe she’d ever been into him in the first place.

“Don’t worry, lassie,” came the assuring voice of Pajuna—and Dulcinea, looking up to receive the compassionate regards of the rest of San Lorenzo, was grateful to have such supportive friends who always knew just what to say to make her feel better. “We’ll _never_ let him do that to you.”

“Yeah!” said Kid Pickles, “I ain’t gonna never approve of that disgusting pervert! I’ll protectcha, Dulcinea, just like how you protected us from everybody’s night terrors!”

“Oh!” piped Vina, “And did you know that everyone knows that you are meant to be with Puss because it is obvious that you love him, so we won’t let anything like that happen ever?”

She blinked at that.

“Oh, oh no, Vina,” finally said Dulcinea, chuckling uncomfortably, “I don’t—I don’t _love_ him like that, I mean—I mean maybe I do, but—“

And why is everyone staring at her like that?

“…Puss and Dulcinea, sitting on a tree~!”

She gasped, outrageous. _“Children!”_

“And-then-they-fall-off-the-tree! …wait, is that how you spell _kissing_?”

“Oh, Arty,” gushed the Duchess, “never change!”

She was blushing under her fur, but knew that she was laughing from deep within her heart. This was the San Lorenzo she knew, with its happy orphans and its laughing townspeople, keeping their brightness shining even in the face of adversary.

“Oh, do not act so oblivious, Dulcinea,” added Mayor Temeroso, whose face actually showed the tiniest hint of a smile. “We all know that you have…”

The entire chamber erupted in a united cheer.

_“A crush on Puss!”_

She blinked. “ _What?_ No, no…You can’t prove anything!”

Pajuna crossed her arms patronizingly. “Riiight, if you say so, lassie. Why don’t you go ahead and marry Evil Puss instead then, hmmm?”

At that, the joy in her eyes was reduced a little. Just a little, so that the tiniest ounce of determination came to fill that in.

“Because,” she responded, firmly, “he’s evil.”

_He’s evil, and that makes it even more imperative that we do the plan as soon as possible—while he’s busy trying to fend off the rebels of his other empires._

At that thought, a question popped into her mind. “Wait…he has other empires?”

Zapata shrugged; Pajuna nodded.

“Like, yeah?” said the Sphinx, and, not for the first time, Dulcinea was surprised to actually hear the winged valley cat voice her presence. Seriously, the Sphinx was good at masking her presence. “Apparently, they’re all different versions of San Lorenzo, because, like, _ugh_ , he won’t stop _bragging_ about how he married other versions of you there and some junk, unless, like, _everybody_ started snoring!”

Dulcinea clenched her paws into fists at that.

He’d been forcibly marrying _other_ Dulcineas to marry him?

_That good-for-nothing little turd!_

“That,” she assured everybody, “will not happen to _this_ version in front of you.” Not without a fight.

_Because we’ll escape tonight._

The determined silence of the entire chamber was broken when a wolf, carrying a bundle of blankets, stepped into the treasure house.

“Delivery for Miss Dulcinea!”

“Oh!” she said, startled at the sudden interruption, but pleased—and, honestly, a little surprised—that her orders had even arrived.

“Where do I put these?” asked the wolf.

“Um…” She did her best to not smile too broadly, lest she gave herself away. She hadn’t really expected him to comply with her wishes, and the blankets weren’t really part of their plan, but…

_All the better that now it was!_

She hid a sort of deviousness behind a wide, innocent smile.

“Just please distribute the blankets to the children?”

* * *

As agreed, they all slept early even before the sun came down. They wanted to preserve the alertness that they would very much need the following morning. One sleepless night was ahead of them, and they needed all the rest they could grab while it was within their reach. Esme had begun yawning to Zapata’s lullabies just after she’d finished her dinner. (Cabbage. Cabbage and thin flakes of fried potatoes. _Outrageous!_ Was that what they were being fed with the entire time they’d been imprisoned? No wonder why the children and the other adults looked so much thinner than she’d last seen them!) The children were yawning just soon after, and it didn’t take too long for the adults to follow their example.

Even if she was the first to lay her head to rest, Dulcinea felt like she was the last one to really fall into slumber, active and frantic as her mind was about the scheme they’d plotted to escape. Thankfully the wolves did not mind or even take the slightest notice on why they slept earlier than usual…or perhaps this was everyone else’s usual sleeping time? Being trapped in a cage all day long tended to tire out the brain after all.

She hadn’t even realized that she’d actually already fallen asleep until she was woken up from it. By what, she didn’t know. She groggily opened her eyes, and held her painful head with a paw as she pushed herself up from the cold floor she slept on. Her back ached, her neck ached, it felt like _every_ muscle inside her body ached, her bones cracking like firecrackers when she arched her back to relieve it from the discomfort. Perhaps sleeping on the metal floor for hours on end tended to do these tortures to the body.

After tending to herself for a few more moments, awareness soon began to wash over her. Dulcinea blinked her sleepiness away, and her vision began to take her surroundings in as her squinting blue eyes glowed brightly against the darkness.

Wait…

_What?_

Something seemed a little amiss here.

She stood. Making careful steps so as to not make any noise with her heels, and stealing cautious glances from left to right, Dulcinea went to the bars of her cage. She leaned in to observe what seemed so wrong, but when her paw reached out to actually _touch_ the cold, metal latch—

The door swung open, giving out a slow, rusty squeak that startled Dulcinea from all this maddening silence.

Paw clutching her heaving chest and heart hammering madly up her throat, Dulcinea, with deliberate, delicate slowness, dared step out of her mysteriously opened cage. And when she waited there, stood there, and _nothing happened_ , she was left all the more baffled.

“This must be a trick,” she mumbled to herself, even as she subconsciously began to walk her way across the marble floor. The _tap-tap_ of her heels resonated throughout the chamber, its echoing empty and hollow in this vast, ominous silence. She took to observing her surroundings, being rendered more and more bewildered by the second as she realized one mysterious thing after another. The wolves were not here. Their spears, still glowing an eerie blue at the torch, were scattered about the ground. And the San Lorenzans…

They were gone.

She observed their cages, and noticed that they’d been opened at the latch just as hers had been—there happened no coercion, no violence, only silent escape. Just the doors simply swinging wide open, as if they’d decided that the prisoners inside were now free to be free. She didn’t even realize that she’d been staring at Cleevil’s deflated dodgeball from inside one of those cages until she tripped over something.

She gasped, and was quick to catch herself before she fell. She didn’t even realize that she’d been holding this much breath, because she was panting right now, she felt _scared_ —

And then she saw what she’d actually tripped over.

It was Esme’s Mister Cubbie.

And white foam was spewing out of its headless neck.

She would have screamed, but her dry throat was voiceless. Feeling like a mouse being chased by a cat, she ran out of there as fast as she could, desperately scampering and almost slipping many times, her fists firmly gathering her skirts so she could run faster. She’d almost slammed herself against the door in her haste, but she was able to push them wide open with beleaguered force, and she stumbled right outside.

Now having escaped from the prisoner house, Dulcinea panted, supporting herself by putting her paws her knees, gripping them as if with all her strength. And it was then when she noticed that, right across the town, someone else suffered from his own laboured breathing. She turned to look at who it was, and when she saw that bundle of orange fur, laid onto the ground with harrowed sounds coming out of his mouth, her eyes widened in surprise—only to be quickly overcome by horror.

_Puss._

Putting aside the protests of her aching muscles, she ran to him, knelt before him, held his paw in hers and worriedly looked at his strained eyes, which were shut close clearly as if to ward off some sort of pain.

“Puss,” she said, shaking him, her voice trembling at the prospect of _losing_ him, “Puss, I’m here. What—what happened? Where does it hurt? What can I do?” His continued laboured breathing did nothing but intensify her fear. “ _Answer_ me, Puss!”

“Dulcinea.” And here, his paw had suddenly shot out to grab her wrist. She stared at it in a moment of confusion, a lost ‘huh?’ escaping from her throat. Then, the beginnings of a deep chuckle rumbled from within his throat, and when he opened his _eyes_ —

“Still can’t tell the difference between us, eh?”

They were red.

* * *

_“Dulcinea!”_

She shot from her dream, panting.

Perhaps it was hours later, but she had no way to know—the only indication that time had indeed passed and morning was fast approaching was the loud snoring of all their wolf guards.

The wolf guards…the San Lorenzans. She heaved a huge sigh of relief.

 _A dream_ , she assured her frantic, fluttering heart, willing it to calm down. _Just a dream._

“Are ya doin’ well, lassie?” whispered Pajuna, a concerned look on her face. “Because you don’t look so well. You’ve been, uh…” The cow uncomfortably to exchanged a look with Zapata, who just shrugged. “…talking in your sleep, and…if ya need to talk about it…”

Dulcinea shook her head, looked at Pajuna with a bright smile. “It was just a dream,” she assured her, and everyone else, she’d noticed, was now staring at her funny. After a while, they shrugged and simply went right back to their business.

“Really, Esme, I’m okay,” Dulcinea further promised the little girl when she noticed that she was still staring at her with those big, imploring eyes.

Dulcinea was consciously trying to avoid looking at the stitched stuffed toy she held.

She shook her head. No time for that. She took on her surroundings, awareness now washing her over, reminding her of how crucial this part of their plan was.

The sight of the sleeping guards just made her more determined to make this escape a success, making a great emphasis on the fact that this scheme was strictly a one-time-thing. If they failed, and the Evil Emperor found out about it, he’ll tighten the security, the wolves will never sleep again, and it will take another extremely long time for the system to revert to being as loose as this once more.

So they had to take this chance while they had it.

She got up, crawled to the bars of her cage, and saw that Pajuna was just silently, _very_ silently, inserting a key into the lock of her cage, extremely careful not to make a single sound. It seemed that every San Lorenzan was all already wide awake and alert, if the town’s collective sigh of relief was any indication when Pajuna successfully got out of her cage and no wolf was roused from their slumber.

The cow quietly tip-toed from cage to cage, handing out her remaining four keys to the other adults—the Duchess, Señora Zapata, the Igualdemontijos, and Eames. As the five of them began to work on their locks, Pajuna approached Dulcinea’s cage, got to work on unlocking it, and then opened it for her to come out.

The white cat smiled up at the cow and mouthed at her a silent _thank you_ , before crawling out of her despicable prison and finally stepping into freedom.

_But no, still not quite free._

She waited until everybody had been freed from their cages, and they gathered quietly around Dulcinea. The orphans were the last to be freed, and when Cleevil accidentally stepped on a wolf’s tail, everybody held their breaths, their hearts hammering up their throat…

Until the wolf drifted back into sleep. Phew.

Now that they were complete, Dulcinea nodded at everyone, commanding them to set to work. The Duchess, who’d been gathering inner magical energy the whole day, immediately proceeded to use that magic to gather as much weight and treasure she could to serve as blockage to the door—soon after, all the empty metal cages were quietly, quietly floating up in the air as the Eldritch witch moved her hands to guide them through the space. Artephius was running from sleeping wolf to sleeping wolf, sprinkling over them a glitter of some sort of formula that the alchemist had managed to conjure from the scraps of ingredients he had up his robe—that should keep the wolves asleep for as long as five minutes, despite any noise anyone might make. Eames and Puss Dos, meanwhile, were looking around for weapons to use, mystic or not, gathering them into one corner where everyone could take their pick later. The Sphinx took flight and stood guard at her position from high up, readying herself for an attack should the doors suddenly open.

The orphans, led by Kid Pickles, used the long, thick fabrics they had cut from their blankets as ropes to tie around the wolves’ feet—they counted twenty-five guards total. They gently prodded their weapons out of their paws, thinking that those Moles’ spears could definitely be of use right now.

Pajuna, Señora Zapata, and Dulcinea led all the other San Lorenzans to rip some more of the blankets to use them as a gag around the wolves’ mouths. This should solve the howling problem, Dulcinea had said, and she received a genuine pat on the back by not only Pajuna, but the rest of the adults. They got to work.

But just when she had finished wrapping up the gag around the last wolf’s mouth…

“Whoopsie! Time’s up!” announced Artephius, and it was at that very moment when all the wolves began to blink their eyes awake, the sleeping spell finally wearing off.

And they froze.

And they began to writhe, struggling from the ropes tied tightly around them.

“Mmmph! Mmph! _Mmmmmph!!_ ”

All the San Lorenzans backed together in a corner, watching in disbelief as they realized that their plan was actually working—no wolf had attacked yet, no wolf had howled yet.

_Their plan was actually working!_

Until they saw that one wolf from the far corner who was just beginning to blink his eyes awake. Every San Lorenzan held their breath as this wolf looked in horror at his tightly bound hands and feet, and _Pajuna_ —

“Oh. No.”

The wolf howled a chilling howl, and that was enough of a signal to rouse the entire town from the outside—if that forcible knocking and screaming onto the door indicated anything.

_“Hey! Open up! Open up and surrender, you have no chance of escaping your prisons! OPEN UP!”_

Pajuna ran to that un-gagged wolf and knocked him unconscious to stop him from his howling. Then she turned at them angrily.

“I thought I told you to gag every single wolf in sight?!”

“This really isn’t the time to play the blame game, Pajuna!” said the Duchess, returning to the gang with her magic gear all in place—she was overjoyed to find it just lying around the corner. Sure, she only had a few magic soul jars in place (namely the fire spell, the sandbag spell, and Klaus von Braunschweig’s transformation spell), but it was better than nothing, right?

Every San Lorenzan geared themselves up, picking up the weapons laid out onto the floor for them by Eames and Puss Dos (“I will fight-stab the enemy, because they hurt the cat whose face is also my face!”) Artephius and the Duchess stood side by side, followed by Zapata and Pajuna, both armed with either golden frying pans or large silver forks. Even Mayor Temeroso, while looking extremely frightened, dared pick up an axe to fight alongside his town. The Junior Puss Squad bravely took the front, with Kid Pickles, Esme, and Toby, led by Cleevil and Vina, armed with either the Moles’ spears or stuff to throw—and the exceptional dodgeball skills they’ve earned during the many times they’ve played it out in the sun.

The people of San Lorenzo backed together tightly as they heard the doors of the treasure house being pounded onto by a battering ram.

“They would break through our defences soon,” observed Pajuna as the stocked metal cages began to move the slightest inches forward with every _Bang!_ of their battering ram.

“You better go get Puss, Dulcinea,” said a breathless Zapata. “ _NOW!_ ”

Spurred by the Señora’s forceful command, Dulcinea broke into a run—running past them and towards the floor that led to the Obelisk’s secret location. She knelt and found for the same spot that had opened it many weeks ago while Puss had wrongly mocked the Duchess, and when she found it, she pressed it—and just like that, she felt the ground shake, and she stepped back to make way for the hole that slowly opened at her prodding. She looked down the hole thoughtfully…until she went and tied many blankets together as a snug long rope to use it so she could gently lower herself down the murky darkness.

But, before she jumped into the hole, she spotted a glint of silver from just behind a bound wolf. She ran to it, grabbed Puss’ sword, and finally went right down to where he was being kept as a prisoner.

* * *

The heels of her boots clacked like castanets against the dusty concrete floor when she let go of the rope to land safely on the ground. After then, she took on the sight that beckoned her forward and walked, her meek voice calling out to the darkness.

“Puss? Puss, are you in here?” She waited for a response, until she felt movement from her right—but she backed away in surprise when she realized that it was nothing but a cockroach shuffling away over to safety.

“Puss?” she tried again. “Puss, we have to go. We really need to…” Her voice trailed off when she spotted a familiar yellow feather shift slightly in the air. His leather hat.

She ran over and grabbed it, her paws running over the surface of its brim to dust it off. When she blew the air from out of her puffed cheeks in an attempt to blow off the dirt, sandy powder rose into the air and provoked her into coughing.

“Ha-ha!” His sharp laugh cut cleanly through her coughing though, and she looked to the side to find that there he was—smiling as happily as ever as if it was just another day awaiting adventure in San Lorenzo.

“Dulcinea!” he greeted, “What brings you down here? From the sounds of explosions and war cries that I faintly hear coming from up above, you are clearly capable of rescuing yourself from the cruel trap of the Evil Emperor and you have no need of my uselessness. Great! Have you come down here to say your final goodbyes? Then I bid you farewell, my lady, it has been my utmost pleasure to have been accepted by you as your acquaintance if not a friend in our short time together; and I am really very _really_ looking forward to spending the rest of my eternity to rot down here in my filthy prison as a rightful and dignified punishment for the heartless crimes I have inflicted upon the innocent people of San Lorenzo. Ha!”

He puffed his chest out as if that was something to be proud of, and then pointed an accusing finger at the walls.

“I have beaten you, walls! I have proven myself to be a nobler creature-thing than you are, for readily accepting what I deserve—rather than just simply standing there like you, and doing _nothing!_ ”

Dulcinea gave him an odd look as her heels clicked against the floor with each step she took towards him. “Puss? Are you…talking to the walls?” Then with a hasty shake of her head, she decided that they’d have to set that aside for now—she immediately went towards the lock of his cage and fiddled with its innards.

“Okay, you know what, we have no time for this.” The lock clicked, and when the door swung open, she grabbed at Puss’ paw and pulled him out of there. “We have to go—“

He yanked his paw from her hold and shut himself back in his cage. “Leave me be, Dulcinea, this cage is where I belong! See how happy I am in the company of the bars?”

She stopped. Looked at him.

“The what?”

“The bars! Come, meet my new friends!” He then began to point at each of the bars that held him inside the cage, like they were people with actual names. “See? This is Leonardo, Sanchez, Niño, Angelina, Carmela, Estacio, Sir Timoteo Montenegro the Third, Rodrigo Alonzo, and Gabriela de la Rosa y de Leoncia. Say _hola_ to our visitor, everyone! Her name is Dulcinea!”

He then frowned at one of the bars scoldingly.

“ _No_ , Niño. I know she is a stranger to you, but there is no need for you to glare at her like so! Where have you learned these despicable actions in the first place? Apologize to Dulcinea at once!”

Dulcinea blinked. Then she began to approach him carefully.

 _Very_ carefully.

“Um…Puss?”

“I said, apologize! At _once_ , you shameless, impenitent person-thing! Apologize, for you have displayed such an arrogance that even I find despicable, for you have been such an egotistical fool, blinded by a foul pride of self, for you have brought danger upon everything and everyone she loves, for continuing on your pathetic existence that the world would be better off without!”

Her face hardened. “Puss, you know I’m not blaming you for anything—”

“You have been accepted into San Lorenzo by the purest of heart,” he continued, speaking as if she hadn’t spoken. “You have been welcomed by its townspeople with open arms, and rather than showering its people with the gratitude they deserve, you steal from them, and your greed has broken off its protective spell and ever since then you bring nothing but doom one darned day after another— “

“Puss, _enough_ —”

“—you instead bring upon the storms of destruction and the wrath of an angry king!”

_“Puss!”_

“And, for being the world’s numero uno most _terrible_ person,” he said this like a salesman promoting his goods, “you deserve nothing, _nothing_ more than an eternity of punishment, nothing more than her hatred! Yes! Now you can see how viciously I am trapped within the walls of my inescapable logic! Ha- _ha!_ ”

She slammed the door of his cage open and stepped inside it and—

He stopped laughing. His head frozen in place where it had jerked sidewards to the force of her slap.

She sighed, and this time, before he got to run away, she gently took his shoulders into her paws.

“Snap out of it, Puss,” she said, her voice prodding him to look into her eyes, even as he had that blank stare as if he was staring right _through_ her and she was not there. “Listen to me when I tell you this. _I don’t hate you._ You are my friend, so please, stop thinking that I do, okay?”

The seconds that passed in silence seemed like forever, but eventually, his answer found his own voice.

“A year, Dulcinea,” he began, and his eyes refocused back to hers. “I have left San Lorenzo unprotected for an entire _year_ , and everyone has been robbed of their freedom as a result.” He turned away, shaking off her paw from his shoulder. “How can you not hate the most hateful gato in existence? You,” he said, chuckling and looking back at her, “You really must have injured your head somewhere along the way…”

And then he extended his arm to lightly, lightly touch her chin with his paw…

Right where she had been bruised by the Emperor-King.

So when she flinched, he immediately withdrew, looking for all in the world like a frightened animal.

“I—I am sorry, Dulcinea! I truly am, I—I have been so forward, I am sorry, I—I did not know what I was thinking!” He laughed, brokenly, “I—”

“No!” she immediately said, “Puss, it’s okay, it’s not what you think—“

“No, it is alright. I understand this hidden disgust you have of me. You feel obligated to save me.” Then he smiled as brightly as day. “Well then, I am pleased to inform you that you are no longer under the obligation to be my friend, for your subscription has already expired. Huzzah! Go now,” he said, raising a fist into the air as if to inspire motivation, “for San Lorenzo needs you!”

That he thought that their friendship was some sort of subscription horrified her to the bone.

“Subscription?! San Lorenzo needs _you!_ What do you want me to do to make you see that?!”

“Pish-posh, you always say that!” And there he suddenly stopped, the cheerful smile on his face fading away slowly, its last dying breath being choked out in a pathetic chuckle of self-pity. “You always say that,” he continued, “when in reality…”

He looked away.

“They do not.”

Dulcinea burst indignantly. “It’s true! _You’re_ the only one who could defeat Evil Puss!”

“And why should I? He punishes me rightfully and deservingly!”

“He has conquered over San Lorenzo!”

“And you are more than capable of deposing him!”

_“He’s evil!”_

“And I am awful!”

_“HE WANTS ME TO MARRY HIM!”_

Then she gasped, covered her mouth. She hadn’t really meant to say _that_ , but now that the cat’s out of the bag…

Then she had no choice but to continue playing it dirty.

Puss had taken a step back, his face so open and wounded by shock and disbelief. His voice had left him blind, and all his mouth could do was keep on forming the words _what, how, how_ dare _he, I—_

“That’s right, Puss,” she said with newfound determination. “He is going to marry me, and you have to stop him. If you could just run away with us—with—with _me_ —”

“I…should probably not stop him.”

She stopped at that. “ _What?_ ”

“I mean,” he said, chuckling uncomfortably, “I am happy for you, Dulcinea! Why should I stop a wonderful marriage from taking place? Only a jealous fool—which I am not—would dare stop you from partaking in such a fantastic union of hearts!” Then he laughed, in that awkward way he did whenever what he was saying was _definitely_ what he meant.

She couldn’t stop herself from screaming then.

“I don’t even _like_ him, Puss! Are you out of your mind?!”

“No! I am more than aware that he is the more capable cat for you than I ever will be! …not that I have ever assumed that I could be for you, mind, no no no, I have never thought of you and I together. Never, for our friendship had always been platonically non-romantic without any romance happening, ha-ha! How ridiculous of you that I have ever thought of you and me that way! Ha! _Never!_ ”

She blinked. “I…didn’t say anything, but…”

“And,” he continued, “he is an emperor, a conqueror—he is a master swordsman and an intelligent warlord, he is a _king_ , whereas I am nothing. Felina, I am not even the hero I often brag I am!” He forced a pained chuckle. “I say, Dulcinea, and I hope you take my advice to heart, that you should accept his offer of marriage!”

And once that dreadful word was out, he seemed to slam against a wall, the weight of the word finally sinking in.

M… _marriage?_

All too suddenly, he couldn’t seem to continue what he was saying, his words trapped within his throat, unable to choke them out. 

“You should…accept…accept his…his offer, to take your hand in his offer of…of… _of_ …”

Then he screamed.

“Gyaargh! _No!_ I cannot live with this!” He fell onto his knees, his chest heaving and his breaths loud and panting, holding his head in his paws. “Free me from the bars of this cage, Dulcinea, and I shall prove to you who the better cat between us is! Free me, and give me a second chance! Let me prove myself worthy of your friendship once more!”

She knelt beside her broken friend, and took him in her arms, gathering the shattered pieces and putting them back together. She hugged him tightly, squeezing that huge mass of insecurity from out of his arrogant exterior and filling him instead with unspoken affection.

He needed it. Constantly.

Sincerely.

Fully.

Rightfully.

 _Deservingly_.

“You are my best friend, Puss,” she said, gently, as she pulled away. “You don’t have to prove anything to me. Okay? Now,” she said, helping him up, and then putting his hat back onto his head where it belonged, “let’s get ourselves out of here and fight.”

She smiled, and offered him his sword. “For San Lorenzo?”

He smiled back, reverently taking his sword from her paws, ever grateful; and it was when he adjusted his hat in what he calls the most dashing angle that she knew that this was once again _that_ Spaniard cat she’d always known that he was…the confident, determined, and self-righteous paladin of San Lorenzo. 

“Alright. For San Lorenzo.”

Dulcinea then helped him step out of his cage, and to their freedom.


	7. Rebellion

Once they’ve helped themselves out of the hole, and got back up on their feet, the two panting cats took in the sight before them.

The treasure house was empty. Well, save for the bound and gagged wolves that struggled to get up from the floor, and some that were nothing more than heaving mass of beat up flesh.

“It looks like they’ve been able to fight their way out,” said Dulcinea with pride in her voice, glad that their plan, premature as it was, was actually working. But then, her ears perked when a battle cry—Mayor Temeroso’s, with his ‘Cowards of San Lorenzo! Today! _Is our day!_ HYAAARGH!’—came from outside.

Dulcinea broke into a run, anxious to join the rebellion. “Come on, Puss!”

They ran across the marble flooring, the tapping of their boots echoing across the chamber. But it was when she touched the door latch to open the doors out wide when Puss suddenly interrupted her, placing his paw on her own. She looked over at him, confused when Puss offered her a sword of her own—a golden one, which he must have picked up from somewhere around here.

“You will need this.”

The confusion cleared. She smiled, took it. “Thanks.”

And then, taking a breath to brace herself, she pushed the doors out wide.

Her eyes and ears were then filled with the feels and sights and sounds and smells of fighting—the feel of the wind and the shadow that whizzed by as the Sphinx flew over the town and summoned fire from the powerful beat of her wings, the sight of Señora Zapata and Pajuna brutally beating the wolves up like old partners in crime, the ominous sounds of thundering barrels as the brave cowards of San Lorenzo barrelled over a series of wolves, the scent of smoke in the air as Artephius and the Duchess fought in tandem, their magic singing an elemental duet.

(After Artephius had clapped his hands once, blue smoke erupted from within and sent the wolves dizzily staggering from the sorcerers—and that’s when the Duchess fired her magic gun into the air, summoning down a rain of sandbags that cruelly crashed onto each wolf that surrounded them.

“And _that’s_ what you get for laughing at my sandbag spell!”

“YEAH! You tell ‘em, Duchy!”)                                                                                             

Puss turned to look at Dulcinea. “Do we have a plan?”

She nodded. “Everyone else would fight the wolves while you fight Evil Puss.”

He blinked. “So…basically we have no idea of what we are supposed to be doing, rather than just go out there, do some swordy stuff, and…hope for the best?”

Her eyes widened, and she evasively looked away. “Um…that’s one way to put it?”

He chuckled, obviously liking how some of his attitudes had rubbed off on her. “I like it.”

Dulcinea fondly rolled her eyes.

“Ugh. Just…ugh! Do you _mind?_ ” screamed Señora Zapata, grunting as she heaved a wolf into the air and threw him into far, far away, the poor chap’s ‘ _Remember meeee!_ ’ fading away into the distance. Señora Zapata faced them, her chest heaving and loud gasping coming out of her mouth. “Would you two just. Stop. _Flirting?!_ _PUSS IN THE BOOTS!!_ ” She hysterically pointed to the side, and with her other punched at an incoming wolf. “He has—“

The two of them gasped when they saw what she was pointing at. _“Esme!”_

The Señora had no other time to diddle when a pack of wolves surrounded her and she had to go take care of them first.

Puss and Dulcinea ran to the little girl, but Esme tried to appease them with, “Don’t worry, Señor Puss! Mister Cubbie and I would take care of him! _Hyah!_ ”

And with that, Esme mightily poked into the eye of the grinning wolf with Mister Cubbie’s paw.

Or at least, intended to—because the wolf was able to dodge her attack, and was now grinning maliciously at the fact that he had the little girl this time.

Puss growled and his paw immediately went to unsheathe his sword, the hiss of iron against the metal ring that held it quick to the ear, but it was just as he was about to come launch at the fiend and beat him up—

When there was the sound of metal hitting the back of his head. With a frozen, clearly-in-pain expression on his face, the wolf let go of Esme and fell to the ground, unconscious.

Puss brightened at the sight of the orphans, each holding some sort of weapon—Toby held a broom, Vina a golden frying pan, and Cleevil was with her signature dodgeball. They were gathered behind their poor victim with triumphant smiles on their faces, and Toby had come up to step onto their vanquished foe, just as they’ve been thought by their one and true master.

“And that’s how it’s done! Begone, evil spawn!”

“Little children!” Puss could have very well sobbed at the sight of the orphans right then and there. They sure do grow up so fast… “How I have trained you so well!”

“Yyyyep, but we ain’t no little no more, cat,” said Kid Pickles with a bite of his pickle, and perhaps it was worth wondering for a moment where he found his pickle jar again…or maybe it was better left unknown. The kid took another bite, raised his pickle pride up into the air, and said, “We are the Junior Puss Squad, and _we say—_ “

The five orphans stroke their signature pose.

_“Fear us, if you dare! HYAAAH!”_

Puss smiled with fatherly pride at the children as they went about on their way to fight more incoming wolves, stabbing and slamming and cannonballing and throwing pickle/dodgeball ammunition along the way.

“Now, Dulcinea,” he said, taking her paw in his, “all we have to do is find Evil Puss, fight him to the death, and San Lorenzo shall be ours once more. The taste of freedom, the victory of a rebellion, fighting for _glory—!_ ”

A foil sword whizzed by and the two were forced to let go of each other with a horrified gasp. For a second they stared at the sword stuck onto the ground, the thin foil still vibrating at the force, until a voice broke through their horror, and they had to look up at the highest thick branch of a dead, leafless tree to find the source of the shooter.

“Hiya, Bootsie,” greeted his evil counterpart, his low, purring voice powerful enough to send shivers down their spines even though he stood high above the turmoil of the war. The dark, purplish, starless night sky was an appropriate backdrop against the skeleton-like reaches of the creepily arboresque tree he stood on, a dim, dark reddish light casting shadows of death and bone all over his form. The moon had already fallen, signalling the incoming hours of the rise of the sun—meaning the night was already slowly preparing itself to give birth to a new dawn.

_But not yet._

“I heard from someone,” Evil Puss began, tone as conversationally condescending as ever. “that San Lorenzo’s _brave_ town hero was actually looking for me. So then, I thought to myself, why not show myself up if that’s what he wants so badly? I mean, after all,” he chuckled, “I’m not a coward. Unlike _you_.”

“I shall only say this once, deplorable emperor,” seethed Puss, paws clenched and _trembling_ with fury. “I am _not_ a coward!”

“Then prove it.” Evil Puss’ green eyes narrowed into slits, looking down at his inferior like a true corrupted dictator. “Prove to me, Puss in Boots, that you’re not _such_ a trembling coward. Accept my challenge, and if you win…” He smirked, laying out his bait.

“…San Lorenzo will be yours.”

At that, Puss took a step back, astonished.

A… _challenge?_

So. This is how it goes. It sounded…simple enough that left Puss justified to feel somewhat cautious of a trap that may lurk around the corners of this shady deal, but the rewards were too tempting to be passed up.

He tightened his grip on the hilt of his sword. _For San Lorenzo._

And so, carefully, cautiously, he began, “What sort of challenge are you offering?”

He was not answered immediately. Evil Puss took his time when he regally lifted his chin in the air, his lips performing a dirty sneer as he looked him down. And right there, as the two opposites stood facing each other, one standing high onto a skeletal throne and the other, standing far below onto the ground in the midst of a passionate war…it took Puss for more than a moment to absorb in full the monstrosity his evil counterpart had become, how this man who _was_ himself but the _opposite_ of himself had sunk so deeply to become this demented psychopath, this broken villain.

Until suddenly, Evil Puss’ eyes widened with mania. White sclera surrounded his shrinking green irises, a creepy sight if you ask Puss, and then finally, he said—

“Two words.”

Evil Puss finally revealed the weapon he hid from behind—a laughing cavalry sword…a scimitar… _the_ Scimitar?!—and thrust it, forcefully, into the air—

“ _Kill me.”_

Puss’ own narrowed eyes widened in astonishment at that. He faltered, and he had to lower his sword—his paw loosening its grip on the hilt, too shocked to be paying attention to how open he lay himself to be attacked.

And even then, he could only utter one word.

“ _What_ … _?_ ”

“Yep.” It did not even seem like that much of a big deal to Evil Puss, or so the nonchalant shrug said. “That’s it! So easy, right? Just kill me. Kill me, and San Lorenzo is aaaaall yours.” Then, a grin spread over his face like a malicious slithering snake. “But if _I_ kill _you_ …well, I guess all shall hail the defending champion!”

“…Felina,” breathed a conflicted Puss, “why would you wish for me to…”

_“Puss—“_

“So can you see my _brilliance_ now, Dulcinea?” cut in Evil Puss before Dulcinea could offer him whatever comforting words she could offer, the vicious scoundrel cackling at her annoyed glare in maniacal delight. Evil Puss turned again to Puss. “My challenge to you is simple. It’s pure, it’s evil, it’s genius…it’s _purrr_ fect. Sorry, I had to say it,” he amended, when he caught Dulcinea roll her eyes. “Because, Puss in Boots? I _know_ you can’t do it. You can’t kill me. You just _can’t_ …”

(Because you’re a coward.)

“Oh, goodness _me_ ,” gushed the Scimitar, his thick, jewel-encrusted metal blade glowing a pure, evil red with each emphatic word, “that’s a good one, my evil companion! Oh, how you’ve grown so deliciously _evil_ in my cold, wicked grasp!”

Evil Puss chuckled. “Well, technically it’s _my_ grasp, but sure. Anything for you, my old friend!”

Dulcinea looked at the laughing villainous duo, and suddenly she was full of dread. She was remembering _that_ stupid little incident with Pygmalion and the evil sword and just one of Puss in Boots’ typical not-really-brilliant ideas. “ _Ugh_. I _told_ you we shouldn’t have left the Scimitar in the middle of the desert….”

Puss had the sense of groan. “Really? Is this the time to be playing the blame game, Dulcinea? Because why did you _not_ tell me,” oh, and he had the further sense to _look_ annoyed, “that Evil Puss actually _had_ the Scimitar?!” Puss was not screaming at her, Dulcinea was aware of that—he was simply angry at the situation, just as much as she was.

“Because I am really very _really_ starting to get tired of the old oh-darn-I-forgot excuse, delaying the reveal of the important details as if to build suspense like we are characters in some lowly piece of fiction!” he ranted. “Because HELLO! _People?!_ A little heads up might have helped a tiny bit?!”

 “I—I didn’t know!” said Dulcinea, and she called out a name from behind her. “ _Pajuna!_ Why didn’t _you_ tell me that Evil Puss had the Scimitar?!”

“We didn’t know either!” replied Pajuna, finishing off a wolf and then dusting off her hooves. Then she called, “ _Eames!_ YOU’RE the former royal adviser! Why didn’t _you_ tell us that Evil Puss had the Scimitar?!”

Eames slammed a frying pan onto a wolf first before he answered. “I didn’t know too! Wait…actually, I did. Why? Was that…” Suddenly, he looked sheepish. “…an important detail?”

Puss groaned. “ _Honestly?_ ”

“Aww,” mock-pouted the evil emperor, “I thought your San Lorenzan fellas _aren’t_ the ones to blame here. Don’t start turning your self-frustrations to your innocent friends now, Puss!”

“And his one _best_ friend!”

Puss rolled his eyes.

“ _Because they’re telling the truth!_ ” pressed Evil Puss, the growl coating his words serving as a warning to Eames or anyone else who dared interrupt the Emperor-King’s glorious monologue. “ _This_ is actually the first time I brought out my beloved sword for the public to see. I’ve been preserving him for your very eyes, Puss in Boots. Aren’t you just flattered?”

Puss stared at his evil counterpart for a moment, an analysing look in his eyes. Then finally, he relented.

“...I guess that does not sound too much like a pathetic attempt to cover up the tiny plot hole.”

“FORGET THE PLOT HOLES!” screamed the Scimitar. “Because very soon, Puss in Boots, you’ll wish you never brought it up. Whatever that was. Because right now…all I want to do is to _stab_ you, countless of times, until you are nothing but a _hole_ -filled corpse! I want you killed, Puss in Boots! Do it, Evil One! Slash, maim, do it! Stab, stab, _staaaab!_ ”

“Iyyergh.” Puss shuddered. “This is low, even for you, Evil Puss. How can you _stand_ that guy…creature…thing-sword?”

Evil Puss tsk-tsked. “Oh, Puss in Boots,” said the Evil One, lovingly stroking the long metal blade of his new, deadly sword. “You wouldn’t know a good thing if it _talked_ to you and convinced you of the good of evil.”

“GYAAHAHAHAHARGH!” laughed the Scimitar. “I _know_ , right?! You goody-two-shoes, holier-than-thou, self- _righteous_ , _arrogant_ little _COWARDS!_ ”

The sword’s condescending laugh blended meltingly with his newfound swordsman’s, whose eyes filled with a malicious red glow in each malevolent cackle.

Puss did not realize that, as Evil Puss cackled, he had been staring at him for more than a moment now, finding something curious, amiss. But it was when he did that Puss gasped—and the piece fell neatly to fit into the puzzle.

“ _Scimitar!_ ” Puss had finally managed to get his bearings back, and how he hissed the name was that of pure revulsion. “So we meet again, with you having corrupted a new victim. And it seems as if you are the mystery behind the uncharacteristic malice of my evil alternative all along!”

“Wait, what?” said Evil Puss, mockery staining his voice, red staining the formerly innocent green of his bright, vivid eyes. “Uncharacteristic? You hear that, dear Scimitar? He said _uncharacteristic._ What a blithering fool!”

“Ha!” agreed the Scimitar, “What a blithering fool indeed! Can’t it be any clearer that you were _already_ this dirty, misbegotten little devil from the very beginning?” The Evil Sword laughed, and with each fitful spasm, his long body throbbed a glowing red—the dark light casting ever blacker shadows upon his nefarious holder. Evil Puss chuckled, saying _aw, shucks_ as if he couldn’t be more flattered. “All I do in our little relationship is _give_ you a little more style,” continued Scimitar. “I mean…look at that foil sword! Yeeesh! How _outdated._ Ancient, just horridly out of style! Just simply _unfashionable!_ ”

Puss gasped in morbid mortification. He was mortified. _Mortified_ , and well beyond his worst nightmares! He took that one word, dissected the syllables, put it in the cassette inside his brain where he could rewind it and hear it in slow-motion _just_ to make sure he _heard it_ _right_ —

_Un-fa-shio-na-ble._

“How DARE you insult my lifelong companion and most loyal weapon! Ha!” He slashed his sword at the air, the long blade perfectly level with his outstretched arm. “That shall not go unpunished. This, I swear!”

Evil Puss chuckled low, and he jumped from where he stood to smoothly land onto the ground.

“Come on, then, Boots,” he challenged, maintaining an open, defenceless stance which _obviously_ had to be some kind of trick.

“Kill me.”

Puss honestly had no idea how to respond to that. Evil Puss had casually put the tip of the Scimitar down at the ground—he was not even beginning to assume a fighting stance!

But now that they stood face-to-face, Puss began to notice the slight differences they had in height—his evil counterpart looked taller, bigger…stronger. The natural effect of possessing one of the mystical swords. That alone put Puss at an unfair disadvantage; and sparring his thin fencing foil against the thick, broad metal of the magic-induced Scimitar was clearly not how a fair fight should go.

He narrowed his eyes, pointed his sword at his enemy as _civilly_ as possible, making it clear in the way of his open, not-yet-threatening stance, that he was _still_ giving him a chance to end this without the pointless blood. Fighting, he could do; if Evil Puss wanted _that_ , he would not hesitate to jump in and give him the most dangerous fight he had ever had in his entire life.

But what Evil Puss asked for was not a fight. He asked to be _killed_.

And it was against his code of honour.

“We,” Puss then began, slowly drawing out his words, even if he knew his nemesis’ chance of redemption was now so infinitesimally small, “do not have to do this.”

“ _Oh_ ,” replied the evil one sardonically, staring at Puss with such intensely vicious green eyes, still so wide as to reveal that much white, “but I insist we _must_.”

At that, a tinge of sentiment bubbled from within his stomach, a deeply buried pain rising up from where he thought he had already buried it in within the recesses of his mind. Once upon a time, Puss in Boots had a best friend, a partner in crime, a loyal compadre, a brother-in-arms, a brother by promise and a brother by blood—and he…he was a golden egg. He was, because was not everybody else, deep inside? And he, instead of tricking him and picking a life of theft and betrayal…he could have done so much good for the world and himself if he just _chose_ it to be.

But because Humpty Alexander Dumpty had chosen the alternative instead…

“Then you leave me no choice.” He stomped down on any rising emotion and stared Evil Puss in the eye. _This is a trap,_ he told himself. _This is what he wants to prove. That you are weak for feeling misguided hope._

_So do not fall for it._

_He wants you to think that he is irredeemable._

_So if he wants to be killed, then so it must be._

The fencer clenched his paw around the hilt of his sword.

_No hard feelings._

“I certainly look forward to kicking your behind—” his arm shot straight out once more, aimed directly at his target’s chest— “and I have done so before, Evil Puss. So I shall again!”

Evil Puss hummed in mild agreement as he lazily looked at his fingers.

“You might want to watch _your_ behind first.”

Puss’ eyes widened at the apparent warning, and he turned to find out just in time that a wolf had been creeping up at him with a large mallet all this while, ready to pound at him with that malicious intent in his wolfish eyes—

_“Capo Ferro!”_

She was a blur of lilac silk and white fur; a kick at the poor wolf’s fingers was enough to make him let go of his weapon.

What a misfortune it was that the iron mallet had to land on his toe.

The wolf cried out a pathetic yowl, wailing his pain away as he hopped away from the felines, holding his throbbing toe in his paws.

“Dulcinea—”

“I’m fine,” assured the girl, her game face on; and from the way she panted, he could tell that she had been fighting for a while now since the Pusses had begun their talk. “Now go after him, Puss!”

He watched, stunned, as she launched herself into the war to fight alongside the San Lorenzans, swinging her sword this way and that to render the dogs growling at her in anger. When a wolf attempted to attack her from behind when she was not looking, Puss would have thrown his sword at just the nick of time to stab the enemy clean through the heart—if Babieca had not immediately come galloping into the rescue, headbutting the surprised wolf and sending flying across the town. The majestic horse could only neigh at Puss, snorting and hooving at the ground as if telling him, _Go now, idiot! We have this!_

Puss went over his shock and saw grace to tip his hat at Babieca in gratitude, who nodded back at him before he galloped away to kick more wolves with his powerful hindlegs.

Then he turned his head to look back at the chuckling Evil Puss, clearly amused as if all this war and destruction was his favourite show at the theatre. He winked at him, then did an impressive series of three backflips in the air until he landed far behind the fences where Puss could not see him, running towards which he assumed was the long, dark alley that led to the orphans’ garden.

Puss in Boots brushed a paw over the brim of his Corinthian leather hat, awash with a new sense of determination. For, perhaps, once in a very long time, he was _not_ going to run away like a scuttling mouse. He was El Gato, and _he_ will be the one to do the chasing, to defeat his greatest enemy once and for all—

(himself.)

* * *

The alley was dark. Shadows whispered threats of death into his ear as Puss whizzed by, the soles of his boots clapping against wood or concrete or cobblestone every time he had to leap into the air onto or to avoid a vast variety of fallen debris. Once, he had to jump back in breathless shock when stones from the rooftops all just suddenly _fell_ towards him without trigger or warning.

Hmmm…without trigger? He could never be quite sure in that regard, so he decided to stay for a moment, suspiciously eying up the building. When seconds passed and nothing happened, he let some of his tension to evaporate a bit, and he moved on; walking deeper into the alley, knowing full well that he was walking down the path where he was about to emerge onto the beloved garden of the orphans soon.

The sounds of the battle grew muffled, and the very volume of his thoughts tuned them out until it sounded as if he had walked a great distance already. But the silence that filled in was a little disturbing as well, because it gave more space for his imagination to work with—shadows suddenly moved about from here and there, spying roaches hid behind fallen wood and concrete, and suddenly it seemed as if the very air had become alive, electrified by his own fear.

_…Fear?_ Ha-ha! Ridiculous. And why should _he_ be afraid of _him?_ It was not as if Evil Puss actually even _had_ a chance when it came to a swordfight against the greatest in the field, _Puss_ , in—

“Oh, _there_ you are, Boots!”

The sudden voice from behind him made his skin jump and he suddenly turned with trained efficiency, sword already at arm’s length.

Evil Puss was unperturbed at the fact that Puss’ blade was actually just pointing at his chest right now. He only smirked _down_ at him, given the height difference; the jeer in his expression and the mockery in his eyes patronizing his measly attempt at an attack.

“So?” he asked. And when Puss said nothing, the latter only staring at him with intensity in his gaze, intent on making it very clear to him that he did not like treating this situation a joke, Evil Puss could only find himself smirking.

It was beginning to seem to Puss that _that_ was the only thing his condescending face could ever do.

“So _are_ you going to take my challenge?” Evil Puss emphasized when Puss stayed silent.

Puss narrowed his eyes. He intended to make it very, very clear that upon making this contract, he wanted no hidden wordplay, no hidden meaning, no hidden charges.

“Only if you stay true to your word.”

Once the words escaped his mouth, Evil Puss made a dramatic show of pulling off this very elaborate gasp, as if someone even _accusing_ him of lying was the worst thing anyone could have ever done to offend him.

“What are you talking about, Bootsie? Of _course_ I will stay true to my word! I will make it very clear to you right now, that _when_ you kill me, you could have your precious San Lorenzo back, all of its citizens safe and sound, as if nothing had even happened, and everything will be back to normal! Isn’t that _right_ , Scimitar?”

“Accept the challenge, Puss in Boots,” implored the taunting voice of the Scimitar. “ _Feel_ the truth of our words, and San Lorenzo will be yours again!”

…though the reward of victory seemed very much worth every scratch, every beating, and every injury that might result from this fight, Puss chose to remain sceptical about the entire situation.

He narrowed his eyes at them. “But I am clearly at a disadvantage.”

Evil Puss gestured at the Scimitar. “What, this? For one thing, Puss in Boots, haven’t _you_ always been the better fighter between us? Because I admit,” he chuckled, “that what I lack in technique… _clean_ technique, that is,” he amended, at the look of disgust that crossed Puss’ face, “is equally balanced by your superior swordsmanship. Don’t you think that my possession of a weapon as strong as the Scimitar…”

“Oh, you _do_ flatter me, Evil Puss!”

“…at least merits my own fair advantage?”

Puss flipped the idea over in his mind.

Frankly, he did not like it.

But with all the other odds stacked against his favour, he guessed that beggars cannot be choosers....

“…what are your conditions?”

“Oh, it’s simple, really,” said the Scimitar this time, and with each pulse of red light from his long blade, the shadows from around them seemed to take a new step in dance. “You will fight like two civil brothers in a fair fencing bout, to kill the other nobly for the possession of a kingdom! This is so exciting! Like two fair prince charmings, battling for the hand of a princess! Cuh- _lassic_. Anyway, you and Evil Puss will stand back to back, and then count nine steps away from each other from the starting point. At the _tenth_ count, the fight begins. That way,” the Scimitar concluded, his voice filled with much suspicious—but not uncharacteristic—enthusiasm, “ _that_ way, the match between you two will be fair. Well, regardless of the sword length of course, but that doesn’t matter. What _does_ matter is, whoever _spills_ the blood of the other…”

“Wins,” finished Evil Puss.

Puss thought it over, his eyes narrowed, his will weakening at the thought that San Lorenzo’s freedom depended entirely upon the success of his disadvantaged position in this unjust bargain.

He had no choice.

He agreed.

* * *

Clouds of dust rose from her heels when an attack forced Dulcinea to slide across the rough, stone surface. Gasping airfuls to her lungs, she stared up at her grinning, wolf opponent. Exhaustion was beginning to set into her muscles and deep into her bones, but she knew she can’t give up. She was trying very hard to stay determined, even as she had to take alarmed steps back, back to where the rest of her fellow tired San Lorenzans had huddled together in fear, as the beta wolf and tens of his brothers advanced on their terrified prey.

The children were all panting and tired. The terror was obvious on Toby’s face. Esme was struggling to be a brave girl with Kid Pickles soothing to convince her not to cry over a wounded elbow. Vina held a silent rage about her with her clenched fists yet resigned eyes.

And Cleevil…looked done paying the tough gal.

Pajuna and Señora Zapata were only obviously trying to mask their own exhaustion with the grim slashes of determined frowns onto their faces, if only for the sake of the children. Mayor Temeroso was a snivelling mess—he jumped every time a wolf even took a step in his direction, and it was beginning to move from silly to plainly pitiful.

Artephius, though his own trepidation showed, stood protectively in front of the Duchess, who held his thin, frail shoulders with the full flesh of her trembling hands. The Sphinx, wounded and sprained in the ankle, was being pushed to them like she was a bag of garbage being added to the already big pile.

Eames and Puss Dos were taking slow steps back to join the huddled group, and Señor and Señora Igualdemontijo could do nought but hold each other in this time of strife.

Babieca whinnied anxiously, stomping his hooves on the ground in agitation and throwing his white mane aggressively, as if to warn the wolves from even getting near him.

And Dulcinea…

“… _please._ ”

A long time ago, she would have condemned herself for even holding a weapon and pointing it at someone else, dropped her sword to the ground as if it were against some moral law. She would have hidden herself away at the first sign of danger, pacifistically ending this entire war with a peaceful surrender rather than endangering everyone else’s lives by fighting a losing battle. Or, perhaps still, she would have walked right up to the wolf and spouted rhymes of peace and goodwill, even accompanying it with a cheerful hug and song.

But this time, even as she pled, implored the beast with her wilful gaze, she held her sword firmly, stood her ground, calculating how to attack the wolf if he dared take a move to hurt one of her friends. She’d learned to fight for herself and for the others. She was no longer as naïve as she used to be.

And she would stand her ground and fight. If anything, just as much as she had taught him to be kinder, Puss in Boots had taught her to be _stronger._

“We don’t have to do this.”

The beta wolf chuckled at her _ridiculous_ proposition.

“Now, now, kitty-kat,” said the beta, clearly having too much fun leading the army without his alpha around. She’d briefly wondered where the alpha was, but she was too overwhelmed by an army attempting to kill them all to focus on one thing or the other. “What makes you _think_ we’re gonna obey you? Huh? _Huh?_ ”

The challenge in his tone hammered the final nail into the coffin. Her paws tightened around the hilt of her sword. Her eyes narrowed.

_This is how it goes, then._

“San Lorenzans,” she said. Two simple words, but they held such authority and power—because, at that, the people of San Lorenzo lifted their heads at their leader’s command, and hope returned to their eyes. They smiled determinedly at the sound of her voice, a telling sign that Dulcinea still had the fire of fight in her—and it spread like a wildfire, her voice a flame that touched each of their hearts and let them _burn_ with the desire to _win_.

“This. Town. Is. Ours!”

She thrust her sword forward.

_“Attack!”_

* * *

The two archenemies stood back-to-back.

Puss held his sword upright, the point facing heavenward, as was the appropriate way—a determination set in his glowing green eyes, poised and composed after having sent a short arrow pre-battle prayer to Felina.

His evil duplicate held a calmer countenance, however, a sort of haughtiness touching his slightly curved up lips, a casual laziness giving off an attitude of superior self-confidence. He was coolly holding the Scimitar with a paw, its deadly, curved tip pointed to the ground, the faint glow of the red jewel embedded into the sword casting shadows all over the dark alley.

And then, as agreed, they began their count at the signal.

_“Allez!”_

They took a step; the first.

_“One.”_

Another.

_“Two.”_

And another.

_“Three.”_

Tail swished in agitation.

_“Four.”_

Green eyes narrowed, looking cautiously at the side…

_“Five.”_

A whisker twitched.

…Something is not right here.

_“Six.”_

A sound from behind.

_“Seven.”_

Angrily clenched a fist.

( _Eight—_ )

Turned, swung his sword out straight, and was not surprised when he found himself pointing it at Evil Puss—who was raising the Scimitar with both paws above his head, his intention clear, his eyes bright with malice, burning an evil, feral red.

Puss' own pupils shrunk into predatory pinpricks.

_Maldito huevo._

“Aw!” mock-sighed the vile villain, malicious laughter in his eyes, his shoulders shaking with mirth as he put the sword back down. “You actually caught me! Not bad.”

The low rumble in his throat grew into a growl.

“ _You_ are the real coward between the two of us.”

“Am I?” Evil Puss flashed him his signature smirk. “Or are _you_ just the fool?”

That did it.

Puss in Boots’ throat unleashed a feral, feline hiss; and, like an angry animal, attacked.


	8. Crossing Swords

He charged at his evil counterpart with the full force of his thin foil, willing it the strength to _move_ the weight of the Scimitar so he could swing it off his opponent’s paw—

Evil Puss sneered, seeing him attempt just that and fail. “You think you can pull that nasty trick off to me, eh?” He riposted, moved his wrist in a circular motion and pried Puss’ sword from his paw instead—making it fly across the air and hit the concrete from the high wall behind him.

Puss growled, spun through the air, landed smoothly on his boots on top of a pile of wooden crates; and, hitting the wall with a back tap of his heel, the sword stuck from high above responded with a thin metallic vibration and landed obediently on his waiting paw.

Then he swung his sword thrice in _octave-quarte-centre_ , finally pointing the tip of his blade at his opponent, perfectly straight and in line with the length of his arm. He nodded to give him the tiniest bit of appreciation.

“This is not the same swordsmanship I encountered yesterday.”

Evil Puss shrugged in response, the smirk on his face indicating he was flattered. “Well, I had an entire year to practice. And I guess I can appreciate your speed.”

Puss was the one who smiled derisively at that, a hum of disagreement rising from his throat.

“I am afraid I cannot return that compliment,” he said, chuckling distractedly for a moment…before his eyes suddenly sharpened.

He lunged—

 _“En garde!_ ”

He leapt, began another bout with his unsuspecting opponent; a look of shock crossed Evil Puss’ face at his rival’s sudden attack, but he managed nonetheless by responding with anger, his eyes glowing redder and redder as their match picked up speed and heat and _friction_ , possibly enough to start a fire each time their blades hit and made the resonant sound of clangoring metal.

“Now,” said Evil Puss breathlessly in the brief moment that their swords crossed, pushing against each other, their faces merely a breath away, “ _this_ is what I call a dance!”

Puss smiled, agreeing; he then smirked at the look on Evil Puss’ face when he overrode his strength with a powerful parry. Evil Puss was quick to recover, annoyance tingeing his features red, and he attacked again. Puss chuckled below the sound of their swords hitting each other, the metal singing through the air as they swung and lunged and parried and riposted, forcing one to back away only to have the other responding with an angry offensive. Lost in the music of swordplay, the tension eased from his body as everything came back into place—it had been a time since he had battled someone who actually matched his swordsmanship, and though those lowly degenerates who call themselves thieves _may_ have been useful everyday punching bags, he appreciated Evil Puss’ overmatched strength and near brilliance with the Scimitar. His strength was a marvel, yes, but well, what do you know, Evil Puss actually _was_ saying the truth that he had less of a grace to execute his techniques than Puss in Boots—not that he would be willing to give him constructive criticism, but his problem was that he held the hilt too tightly, perhaps out of anger or tension, which limited the movements of his wrist and arm and left him slow to defend or attack, leaving him with too many openings.

Finding one, Puss lunged—yet was actually surprised to hear his sword clang against the Scimitar’s defence.

“What is your _problem_ , Evil Puss?!” griped the Scimitar, who then moved by itself again to defend his lousy swordsman from another attack from Puss.

“And what is _yours?!_ ” riposted Evil Puss, who grabbed Scimitar back into his paws and swung it violently to Puss, who jumped just in time to avoid the blade of his opponent.

But Evil Puss was not focused on the swordfight.

He commanded the Scimitar, “ _I_ control _you!_ ”

“No,” backlashed the Scimitar sarcastically, “ _Really?_ ”

Evil Puss’ began to struggle against his sword, but his eyes had no choice but to glow red as the Scimitar _forced_ his magic through his holder’s veins.

“I am your master, swordsman! _You_ obey _me_. Yes,” intoned the Scimitar in his voice full of poisoned honey, “yes…that’s right, _feel_ the evil, this _delicious_ evil…flowing through you!”

…and then a brand new cackling demon was born from within.

“HA!” said the newly evilized Evil Puss, his formally handsome green eyes now glowing a diabolical red. Now was a wrathful fellow, the gone other now a mere shadow. “Get ready to _die_ , Puss in Boots!”

 _How fortunate am I,_ Puss thought to himself, _that my sword is not a living thing?_ He rolled his eyes at the sight of his enemies fighting each other’s wills, but then immediately froze when he noticed Evil Puss slowly raising the cackling Scimitar up in the air.

And swung it down _hard_.

Puss frantically jumped away and hissed like a cat, and then stared in horror at the severely cracked floor where he had just been standing on like about two seconds ago.

Uh-oh.

Evil Puss pulled his sword out of the ground with brute strength as he maniacally laughed at the look of his opponent’s dread. He raised his sword up again—

And then the barrage began.

Evil Puss began to mindlessly swing the Scimitar around with naught but violence, Puss frantically jumping from place to place as the cackling sword left a trail of destruction in Evil Puss’ deranged, frenzied wake—with each swing he laughingly kept crashing the piles of wooden crates and smashing the concrete floor, once even shooting the Scimitar like an arrow, only to have it slam straight against the wall, the blade sticking out from where Puss had ducked his head just in time to avoid being beheaded right then and there.

Heart hammering in his throat, paw tightly holding onto his hat to keep it in place, and chest heaving short, fast, panicked breaths, Puss put his sword back on his belt and leapt into the air, landing on the ground as far away from Evil Puss as possible, running on all fours across the dark alley—

He jumped back, gasping as he took in the sight of the Scimitar embedded right onto the crashed stone of the floor like Excalibur waiting to be pulled by its owner. He looked up, spotted his evil counterpart stealthily balanced against a high peg on the wall, the deadly red glow of his eyes impossible to miss against the darkness—and then Evil Puss jumped, landing cleanly right in front of Puss.

He pulled the Scimitar from the ground, those eyes still glowing red. He walked, each step of his boot against the floor an ominous threat as they echoed off against the walls.

He smirked down at Puss, who was lying on his back against the floor, his elbows barely supporting his own weight as he panted to breathe.

“Running away again, now, are we?”

Puss gritted his teeth at the mockery. He moved out of the way just in time when his crazed enemy once again mindlessly crashed the Scimitar down the floor. Puss got to his feet, drew his sword out again in a microsecond, thought to himself—

No running away. _Think_. How do you defeat a mindless beast?

Evil Puss is strong.

_So use it against him._

He smiled secretly to himself as he thought of it. Just as a wise lady once said: _Make use of the things you know, and you can beat the strongest foe!_

(…he cannot believe he had just thought of one of her rhymes in the middle of such a serious battle.)

Evil Puss angrily thrust the Scimitar down onto him, which slammed against Puss’ sword with a metallic clang when he defended himself with it just in time—

(Did Puss just hear his wrist muscles _break?_ )

“Get your head in the game, will you?!” snarled Evil Puss, pushing the blade of the Scimitar against the length of his fencing sword, forcing Puss to take a step back with his abominable strength.

Puss narrowed his eyes. Using his pained wrist as an advantage, he held the hilt of his sword as lightly as a feather, and tricked him with an attack, thin sword against the broad metal of his opponent’s blade—

Evil Puss parried, their swords meeting half-blade, satisfied with his offence. But then when _Puss_ was the one wearing a smirk this time, Evil Puss blinked in confusion—and in one, fluid motion of his wrist, Puss easily maneuvered the Scimitar with a quick circular reflex, the force prying it out of Evil Puss’ paw, and then set it firmly embedded on the floor below them.

Evil Puss growled, but before he could get and grab his sword again, Puss protectively stepped in front of the Scimitar, directing the point of his foil at Evil Puss, who was now forced to back away from his enemy now that he was unarmed. He took trembling steps back as Puss advanced on him, sword still pointed at length, until the feet of his evil duplicate found a stone and caused him to tumble back pathetically.

“No,” he stuttered, voice full of panic as Puss loomed threateningly over him. The red glow in his eyes was gone, replaced now by seemingly innocent green ones. “No no no no _please no_ , I—I didn’t mean it, I didn’t mean any of it!” He continued to back his body away by his elbows until he finally hit the wall. He looked up at Puss pathetically, practically spluttered, “I—I’ll do anything you want! Anything, anything at all! I beg you, _please_ , I—San Lorenzo is all yours, I’ll command the wolves never to see you again, I’d get out of your world and never come back, I—“

“ _Don’t_ listen to his sweety-talk, Puss in Boots,” whispered the Scimitar, his devil’s voice a sickly sweet mellisonant song of sin and death. “Kill your opponent. This is finally your chance for you to end this little game—with _your_ victory!”

Puss raised his sword up in the air, his eyes and mind blank, empty.

And then he suddenly realized what he was actually holding.

“Scimitar!” he said in shock, blinking his eyes at the sword he did not even realize that he had been holding. “But I thought you were actually rooting for _him?_ ”

The Scimitar scoffed condescendingly. “I’m rooting for _no one!_ I just want to be fed! And besides, Evil Puss is getting kind of annoying, so, you know…. _KILL HIM!_ ”

“Please don’t!” piped in Evil Puss as he crawled to the ground so he could kneel properly in front of Puss. “I mean my promises! San Lorenzo is yours! I’ll take my wolves back to where they came from! Just…” He joined his paws in prayer. “Just please don’t kill me!”

Puss narrowed his eyes down at him, his attention from the Scimitar now averted.

“How do I know,” he began to ask, his voice eerily calm and low yet somehow menacing, “that you are not merely bluffing?”

“You _have_ to believe me, Puss in Boots!” cried Evil Puss. (But _was_ he the evil one?) “It’s all on the Scimitar, he was controlling me, I can’t help it, and I—I—“

“Lies!” With a sudden surge of anger from his chest, Puss swung the Scimitar so that the curve of its blade forced Evil Puss to raise his chin in the air. He narrowed his eyes down at him as if he was nothing but a dirty cur. “You shall be slain for all the evil you have inflicted upon the Netherworld. Upon the children. Upon our town. Upon _Dulcinea_.”

He thought about Evil Puss actually having hurt her the first time they arrived in the treasure house. Just now, he realized the monstrosity of how he had _ever_ even thought that this deplorable lowlife could deserve to have Dulcinea as his wife. And who knows what else he had done to hurt her while Puss was locked up somewhere else, unable to fight for her?

Puss did not realize that as he was talking, the faintest glow of red had begun to cover his green irises, filling it, consuming it, growing brighter and brighter by the tick of a second.

“You shall be killed.” He raised his sword up in the air, ready to swing it down. “For attempting to kill the spirit of San Lorenzo!”

“Hee-haa-haa-haa!” cackled the Scimitar along with him, “FINALLY! Yes, _feed_ me his blood! _Feed_ me, _feed_ me! Oh, how it’s been so _long_ since I drank a cup of pure evil!”

“NOOO!”

…seconds passed.

And still, nothing happened.

“Ugh, what are you _waiting_ for, Puss in Boots?” whined the Scimitar impatiently. “ _Kill him!_ ”

“I—I—“ Puss battled the Scimitar’s will, shut his eyes close, kept telling himself no, _no_ , my mind is my own, _no_ —

“ _I_ _cannot._ ”

And then he struck the evil sword down on the ground beside Evil Puss.

Panting and gasping from his internal battle, Puss staggered in his steps, holding his head in his paws as if to quell some sort of intense pain.

Evil Puss dropped the act. He rolled his eyes, got up, dusted off the dirt from his fur, walked up to Puss…

And punched him in the stomach. Puss reeled from the blow and was forced to his knees. Evil Puss walked back to retrieve the Scimitar in his paws once more, saying one, contemptible word as he drew himself near to Puss, looming threateningly over him.

“ _Sentiment_ ,” he practically spat.

“Huh,” scoffed the Scimitar, “Pathetic indeed. I guess I was in good paws after all this whole while— _ugh_ , people who think evil is evil are such idiots.”

“Agreed, my dear Scimitar,” said the Evil Puss. “Finally,” he then drawled, “the moment I’ve been waiting for. I’ve said this before, and I will say it again. Because oh, the _stupidity!_ You think that _I_ am the evil you, when the truth is…” He chuckled. “ _You_ are the weak _me_. Once again, we have proven that fact correct. Now, before I kill you, Puss in Boots…” His voice had dropped to a whisper. “I want to ask you something.”

Puss looked up from his pain, a sheen of moist covering his green eyes, the urge to spit clear in the bite of his voice.

_“What?”_

“Oh, I don’t know, I’ve just been wondering recently.” Evil Puss casually looked at his claws, delaying his question as if to build the suspense.

And then he finally dropped the bomb.

“Are the Prophecies true?”

His whiskers stiffened. His eyes widened.

And suddenly, his heart began to beat faster again.

“…why do you ask?”

Evil Puss smiled, satisfied with his answer. “Ah, so they _are_ true.”

Whatever he was up to, it was _not_ going to be anything good.

The fight returned to his eyes. _“Answer me, villain!”_

“Oh, I don’t know,” responded Evil Puss, his tone that of a conversational one, as if this was merely one of his everyday arguments with his best friend and not at all a matter of life-and-death with his archenemy. “It’s just that…while I was enjoying my reign of terror in the Netherworld, I found some very…interesting…Zephilim literature about the Chosen One from the Ancient Prophecy. He who is fated to pass a series of daring tests, right before he embarks on a quest to defeat his ultimate villain—the Evil One, who will rise against the doom that befalls the mythical town of San Lorenzo.” He gestured a paw to himself, a proud smile gracing his face. “Also known as yours truly.”

Puss got up from the ground, finding the strength to stand on his two boots once again.

“First off,” he growled accusatively, “the One is not a he. She is a _she!_ And second off, it is called the _Great_ Prophecy, evil emperor, of which Dulcinea is the One!”

“Oh, oh yes! My bad. I've actually heard them say it. Dulcinea…” His voice seemed to fall into a serene, dreamlike trance, tainted by a sort of sadness Puss cannot identify. “She _is_ the One, isn’t she?”

Annoyance swept into Puss’ features as all kinds of horrible thoughts swarmed him like a horde of bees. What is this newfound interest he had on Dulcinea? His paw tightened around the hilt of his sword.

“And why do you care? What are you planning?''

Evil Puss paused for a while, sparing him a thoughtful glance before he answered.

“I want you to know,” Evil Puss said eventually with a mock-sigh of exasperation, “that I intend to eliminate every single pest that threatens the glory of my empire. I mean…” He shrugged nonchalantly, “it’s always just one rebellion after another. Don’t get me wrong, I _love_ kicking the other Puss’ butts, but I’m getting tired of this tediousness. Victory always comes in so easily. So, I want to be over it. By eliminating this mystical _Chosen One_ that those Zephilims were so obsessed with. See? Simple! Easy peasy, ham and cheesy! Wait, I can’t believe I just said that…”

“Leave Dulcinea out of your destructive tedium,” threatened a suddenly alarmed Puss, a reborn anger flush in his blood. He would _not_ let this villain maim her, touch her, hurt her in any way. Not when he was here to protect her, and protect her to his death he _shall_. “Fight me, and you shall lose! This—” he struck his sword out again, not willing to surrender— “I swear!”

( _Who was he kidding._ )

“Okay, maybe.” Evil Puss nodded at him patronizingly. “Maybe…but only because I’ve had enough fun with all the drama of our little fight. This is getting old! Let’s end this now, shall we, Alpha?”

_…Alpha?_

Fear descended upon Puss when he realized what that meant; and as if on cue, the large shadow of a wolf fell upon him.

And another.

And _another_.

He did not turn to look at the three wolves who he _knew_ stood behind him threateningly with those trademark wolfish grins they had. He simply angrily stared at his opponent, his voice betrayed.

“But our deal,” he gritted out. “Whoever kills the other—for San Lorenzo—“

“It’s a hoax.” Evil Puss’ tone was bordering on bored, oblivious of the struck horror on his counterpart’s face. “ _Yes_ , Puss, all of it was just playacting. I wanted to see how you’d react under pressure and all. Not that you had the slightest chance of winning, what with that disgusting sentiment you have over me! I mean,” he chuckled mockingly, “did you _really_ think I’d just _let_ you kill me and have San Lorenzo all for yourself? Because if you did, you’re _stupider_ than I thought!”

No word could describe the anger he felt. When a sudden flash of red crossed his eyes, Evil Puss stepped back a bit in alarm—

“Have you no honour, you _coward?!_ ”

Evil Puss’ face hardened at the accusation, his own eyes glowing red themselves when he narrowed them back at him.

“I’m _not_ a coward. It’s just that…”

The red glow then vanished to return his eyes to their normal green, and a smirk spread on his face.

“…I fight dirty.”

Puss turned to the sound of the heaving bulk of furry flesh and met the three large wolves’ feral eyes with his. The black shadows they cast illuminated the green on his feline eyes. He had fought wolves before.

And he would really rather _not_ do so again….

* * *

“Children, _go!_ ”

The children were screaming at the top of their lungs as they ran from a legion of wolves attempting to swarm them. Esme held Mister Cubbie as if for dear life, Kid Pickles was panting loudly and was forced to abandon his pickle jar when it accidentally slipped from his hands, and Cleevil and Vina had already thrown their last dodgeballs, rendering them unarmed. Toby was screaming from behind them as they ran, ran—but it was when he tripped that he collided with the other children and the rest of them fell under his weight.

_“Dulcinea!”_

Dulcinea gritted her teeth as she forced a wolf back by swinging her blade and then sending him flying far away—

“ _Children!_ ”

But before she could run to them to rescue them, the wolves had reached the children first, forced them to their feet, threateningly pointing spears at them as if to warn Dulcinea that another move from her would coerce them to hurt her beloved orphans.

“ _Try_ ,” growled a wolf, suddenly holding a struggling Esme up in the air, “or I _will_ hurt her.”

Dulcinea clenched her fists, her heart wavering. They were _losing_. When the San Lorenzans had grown tired of waiting for Puss, Dulcinea had led them to run for the exit in an attempt to run as far away from here as possible (she intended to stay after she led them out, of course), but then they saw that the borders were guarded by more and more wolves, who growled at them and forced them to run back. Even Pajuna was shocked to see that Evil Puss had such a large army—they could only wonder from which diabolical world he got the beasts from, because one fact remained.

They’d imprisoned the San Lorenzans in their own home.

_Where ARE you, Puss?!_

“Dulcinea!”

At the sound of her name, Dulcinea turned, and her face brightened with such a relief when she saw him finally run out of that alley, breathless, panting.

The wolves gasped at the sight of him, and, not intending to fight the legendary Puss in Boots, growled beneath their throats as the beta commanded them to take the children away from here and get them back into their cages.

“ _Dulcinea!_ ” came Esme’s last, long scream before the wolves dragged her and the other struggling and kicking and angry orphans back into their prisons in the treasure house, shutting the doors to lock them away again from the rest of the world.

Dulcinea grabbed Puss by the arm and attempted to run with him to chase them.

“Puss, the children!”

“Dulcinea…I…”

And then, just like that, Puss weakly collapsed to the floor, his breathing dangerously laboured—his paw holding his side tightly as if to suppress an urgent pain.

Dulcinea gasped, then fell to her knees beside him. And suddenly, the war around their world seemed to silence, and only the two of them existed. She gently grasped at his shoulder, looked at him worriedly, said with a trembling voice, “Puss, are you…alright?”

“Barely.” He struggled to get back on his feet, and when he did, he immediately put on a mask of bravery, concealing his pain as if for her sake. Then he whistled, summoning Babieca—who galloped to their direction almost immediately, leaving kicked and bruised wolves in his trampling wake.

Puss nodded up at Babieca, raised a fist in the air. “We go at once!”

But before he could jump up onto the Babieca’s back—

“We can’t just _leave_ them here, Puss!”

He stopped to look at her. Then, with a sigh, he met her paw on his shoulder with one of his own, smiled at her though it was strained, urgency apparent in his low undertones.

“We _must_ go, sweetheart, while we still have the chance. I am sure that we’ve—“

And suddenly he keeled, as if attacked by a pain in his stomach.

“Puss!” said Dulcinea, immediately kneeling beside him, alarmed.

“I am…alright…”

_“Dulcinea!”_

Dulcinea turned her head to look behind her to follow the sound of the voice. But then, when she saw that it was a grinning wolf, his shadow looming threateningly over the two cats…

Suddenly, the wolf collapsed to the ground. When he did, it was revealed that someone had knocked him unconscious for them—and Dulcinea brightened with gratitude when she saw who it was.

“Pajuna!”

“Go,” she said, her breathless voice steaming with urgency. “Go with him, lassie. We’ve got this.”

She frowned. “We are _not_ _leaving_ without everyone—“

“Everyone has more chances of survival if even just the two of San Lorenzo aren’t locked up in cages!” she practically screamed, gesturing at all the panic and turmoil raging from all around them. The wolves were beginning to capture the San Lorenzans one by one, and dragging them screaming and kicking back into the dreaded prisoner house. “Rescue us later, but for now, GO!”

Pajuna grunted violently when she punched a wolf that had been creeping up from behind her, and was then swarmed by four more wolves to hold her down.

Dulcinea wanted so much to _help_ , but she could do nothing—and was reminded of that painful fact when she felt Puss’ paw on her shoulder.

“Dulcinea, we need to go quickly,” he said, then paused as if attacked by intense pain— “before that evil villain regains his strength. I promise that we shall return to save our friends—but only after we have designed a more viable plan of attack.”

“ _Puss_ ,” she said, turning to him, “the _plan_ was to defeat Evil Puss and make all the wolves surrender! If Evil Puss is down, why don’t you take the opportunity _now_ to—”

He waived her arguments away as if to clear a rising fog. “We have no time for this! Babieca, you filthy horse!” he called, walking up to the stallion, “Let us go leave this town for good! Do you hear me? _Quickly!_ ”

Wait.

…filthy horse?

Babieca arched an eyebrow at that.

Dulcinea had noticed it as well. With a newfound suspicion descending upon her…

“Puss…” she said, stepping towards him deliberately, “Did you just call Babieca filthy?”

An offended whicker escaped Babieca; suddenly, the accusation solidified in Dulcinea’s eyes.

Puss blinked at the two of them. “…What?”

Dulcinea walked to him, as calmly as a lady.

And then punched him in the stomach, making him suddenly keel over in real, actual pain.

“And this,” she said, snatching the stolen yellow-feathered leather hat from his head, “does not belong to you!”

With that, she left Evil Puss gasping onto the floor like a worm. Babieca spat at the ground beside the imposter first before he trotted after Dulcinea with a neigh, tail swishing anxiously for his real master.

* * *

Dulcinea reached the dark alley running, and immediately spotted his vibrant orange fur in the darkness—and he was sprawled on the floor.

She ran towards him, knelt beside him, cradled him in her lap as she worriedly looked over him to spot for any injuries. There was none, but she feared what Evil Puss might have just done to him to subdue him like this…

“Puss,” she said, warding off her thoughts to focus on him, “Are you okay?”

She received no response for a while, and her heart hammered as thoughts swarmed her mind again…

But then he stirred.

“I am…alright…” came his rough, laboured words, and she released a sigh of relief.

“You are, are you,” she said, smiling widely, and her paw came up to wipe a few stray tears that she didn’t know had already gathered at the corner of her eyes. She’d been so sick with worry, thinking about what Evil Puss might have done to him—or, or _worse_ —

Dulcinea looked at Puss, who was clutching at his side, a real pain in his eyes this time.

She clenched her fists.

And then decided.

“Come on now, Puss,” she said, her determination renewed as she hauled up his weight to her shoulders. “We have to leave while we still have the chance. Babieca!” she called, “Come on, we have to—”

“ _No!_ ” protested Puss, and though the sudden movement made him flinch in pain, he continued to struggle to get on his own feet, not wanting Dulcinea to carry his burden. “We must free them—the people of San Lorenzo—I cannot run away from this anymore, I—“

“We _are_ the people of San Lorenzo!” she cried, refusing to let him stand on his own if it meant his own downfall. And when Puss didn’t respond to that, Dulcinea lowered her voice, said gently, “You _are_ of San Lorenzo, Puss. Just as much as I am.” Her paw tightened its hold on his shoulder as she remembered what Pajuna had said. “And we have more chances of saving everyone if even just two of San Lorenzo’s are not locked in cages. So let’s go now before they—“

“ _PUSS IN BOOTS!_ ” screamed an enraged Evil Puss, the furious villain now walking down the alley with his army right behind him. “Surrender him now, _Dulcinea_. Or I’ll haunt you even in your dreams, hunt you down until you’re killed!”

Babieca knelt before the two cats, urgency in his eyes; and then, seeing no other option, she unclenched her fists from her skirts and picked Puss up from his wobbling legs, ignoring his startled _‘Whoa!’_ at the suddenness of her action; she leapt into the air with him on her arms, and then landed cleanly on Babieca’s back—

“Oh, _no_ , my pet,” came the mockery of Evil Puss, “I’m afraid you have nowhere to run now, because I have you _helplessly_ trapped in this lovely cage of a town that I built _especially_ for you.”

Stalwartly ignoring his words, she held Puss tightly with a paw, and with the other, held onto their white stallion.

“Let’s go, Babieca. _Hyah!_ ”

At that command, their majestic stallion broke into a gallop, and then leapt high into the air with the powerful beat of his legs, jumping high over the army of gathered wolves—and Evil Puss, unable to do anything, could only stare after them in anger when Babieca smoothly landed onto the ground and immediately galloped away and far out of town and into the rising sun, easily outrunning any who dared run after him.

The alpha wolf stared after them in awe. “Whoa.”

Evil Puss turned to him. “… _what_ did you say?”

The startled alpha was quick to make amends. “Um…nothing, nothing!” And then, as if to please his boss, he turned to his soldiers, commanded clearly—

“ _Hey_ , you bunch o’ idiotic _losers!_ Are you the Bloodwolf’s avatars, or are you pathetic little _wimps?_ Make sure no prisoner escapes again, you understand?!”


	9. That Feeling in My Chest Area

Babieca galloped as fast and as far away from San Lorenzo as he possibly could, clouds of desert sand bursting in his trampish wake as the sun itself travelled across the horizon and had itself comfortably perched high on the red doomsday sky. The Western Desert felt unusually cold at this time of the day what with the breeze blowing icy chills down her spine. Dulcinea, though very thankful that they had their protective fur, could only wonder how on Earth they were going to manage it through the night when this cold was only bound to get worse. The only stuff of blankets she had with her was the long strips of cloth she’d managed to bring with her, and the only use she had of them were as bandages to Puss right wrist—it had looked a bit displaced when she last checked it, and Puss had reluctantly confirmed her careful observations with an uncomfortable chuckle when he said that the wolves _may_ have managed to beat him up a bit…and fighting Evil Puss, with his heavy Scimitar, had forced him to stretch his right wrist quite a few times during their battle.

That, essentially, sounded bad to Dulcinea. He assured her that it was no matter, that his mentor El Guante Blanco had polished his ambidexterity to the fullest, that he could still skilfully use the sword and fight with his left hand, despite a dysfunctional arm. Dulcinea was not convinced, and most certainly not approving—and it wasn’t just that he was injured. It was the fact that even Puss was no match against his evil counterpart’s dirty tricks, what with his Scimitar and his wolf bodyguards and the trump card that he practically held all of San Lorenzo in his very paws and could very well crush them at will.

Also, an injured Puss. He could not and should not be let into any battles any time soon. Though he met her suggestion with outrage, denying that he was tired and that he did not need to rest, Dulcinea had still somehow managed to convince him that it would be advisable for him to restore his energy if he wanted to be on his fullest when they faced the Evil Emperor once more. She allowed him to rest his head on her lap so he could sleep, his hat drawn over his face, lulled into the bliss of siesta by the constant rhythm of Babieca’s steady gait as Dulcinea made sure to keep a lookout.

But she wasn’t without thoughts as she did so. Every now and then she would look at Puss’ sleeping form, and then back at the vast, overwhelming expanse of the empty desertscape ahead of them. She kept thinking of ways of how to bring up that elusive topic that seemed to be just dangling dangerously on the very edge of a cliff, waiting to be either pulled up to the rescue or shoved down to its death—because else it will suffer there, suspended forever.

_…what now?_

She thought and thought and thought until the frustration began to eat at her. San Lorenzo was a prison and going back there would be surrender—and Dulcinea was determined never to return there in a million years if it meant the satisfaction of that demented and obnoxious little turd. The only way to win their town back was to overthrow Evil Puss from his vainglorious throne of self-importance, but that would be nigh impossible with his legion of wolf guards that, though individually mindless, made an undoubtedly formidable army. She thought of seeking the help of the moles, perhaps even the megamicres—they made an army, after all, and surely they would readily agree to seize their home back. For a moment, it didn’t seem like such a bad plan. They were going to get through this after all, like they’ve always done in the past. They would kick the bad guys’ butts, save the town and save the day! Her mood was quick to lift, and she immediately began dancing over cloud nine, overjoyed to think of how everything will be back to normal again once they’ve succeeded. The kids would get to play dodgeball again, Pajuna would be serving drinks again, everyone would be under the sun again, and Puss, well, he would be back to laughing amidst the music of clashing swords, doubtless while dancing on the top of thieves’ heads.

But just as she recalled Mayor Temeroso saying that the moles were freed and no longer imprisoned in San Lorenzo, her cloud nine disappeared like a popped bubble, and she fell screaming into a bottomless pit.

Because for one thing, she didn’t even _know_ the first place where to find the moles.

The mystic dowsing rod of Akhenaten might help, but it was back in Artephius’ shop or not there at all. They might go sneak back in town and risk being caught just to get it back in their paws, but as she began to get optimistic again about her half-formed plan she immediately remembered that the rod was defunct, broken by a nameless ginger cat who had once commanded it to search for catnip.

She groaned. She was quickly running out of options and thinking of it all without any rewarding results physically exhausted her. A weight had settled in her heart like a hairball that refused to get swallowed or choked out, just simply there to continue being a discomfort, asking simple, straightforward questions that she found very difficult to answer.

_…are you just going to keep running away forever, then?_

Dulcinea buried her shut eyes into her clenched fists as Babieca continued to canter across the wastelands. She was aware that she was stalling and Puss was stalling and time was against them, because every second that ticked tocked their chances away…if they even had one in the first place.

She did not know what to _do_.                                           

About an hour or so of this painful ruminating had passed when Puss was finally jolted awake from his catnap—but with a little bit of a panic, as if he’d awakened from a nightmare. Before Dulcinea could ask what was wrong, however, the panic from his eyes immediately evaporated when he saw her and Babieca, reassured that nothing bad had happened. He’d even let his paw rest gently over hers, as if he needed to physically touch her to be assured that she was really there. She briefly wondered what he’d dreamed about, but decided not to ask when Puss apparently tried all sorts of ways to avoid her curious gaze, clearly not wanting to talk about it. She decided to respect his privacy, although if she were to be honest with herself, it…disappointed her a little, that Puss still wouldn’t be so ready to share and open up to her about things like those, and after all the time they’d been together.

No words were exchanged as they rode further into the red, sandy desert, aimless and directionless. The silence followed them like a gloomy cloud, threatening and rumbling, forecasting omens, just waiting to unleash its storms. Dulcinea itched to say _something_ to get that stupid hairball off her chest, but she was reluctant to start a conversation because for one, Puss didn’t seem to even _want_ to talk—the usually talkative showman loved to hear his own voice after all, and this unusual silence was testament that he wasn’t ready to start hearing about anything San Lorenzo-related yet. Not yet, especially after their humiliating defeat and cowardly escape from their pathetic attempt at a rebellion against Evil Puss and his wolf army. He was not yet ready to start hearing about how the odds were so blatantly stacked up against them, not ready to hear that no solution seemed to be in place, not ready to hear the truth.

(And he probably never will be.)                          

So Dulcinea chose it best to remain quiet. It was very unlike her to let him be and let him wallow, because usually, she’d be the first one making the effort to pull him out of the depressive hole he seemed to be having so much fun dwelling into lately. But the thing was…she can’t rescue somebody if she herself was stuck in her own hole. 

Her ears twitched. For a moment, she dismissed it as the howling wind, a scuttling cockroach, the shifting of desert sand, but the sound persisted until the alarm grew in the air. The metallic tap of paw against hilt drew her to look at Puss, who had his gaze focused on somewhere far away. Babieca paused, turning its head to look at the cats on his back. Dulcinea waited, until…

_“Yes, they were the worst.”_

A low and heavy rumbling began to thunder from all across the land, and it seemed to come directly from where they’d come from, the rumbling increasing in intensity as it came closer and closer and closer—Dulcinea followed Puss’ now wide-eyed gaze as she realized what he was thinking. The noise came… _from San Lorenzo?_ Their stallion neighed and violently backed away in fright, and it took Puss and Dulcinea one more moment to realize what was actually happening—

They exchanged a look.

An earthquake.

_“Every day, they increased in frequency, in intensity, in severity…”_

There was nothing to do but wait it out until it was over, but Puss did have to command Babieca to break into gallop before a high column of sandy stone came crashing down on top of them. But as Babieca’s hooves frantically skipped over the quaking earth, he lost his balance, accidentally sending Puss and Dulcinea screaming into the air as they were bucked off his back.

“… _thus the broken buildings, the cracked walls, and all the glorious destruction.”_

The moment Dulcinea rolled off the ground was the moment silence once again reigned over the deserted wasteland, acting like nothing even happened. She groaned and pulled herself off the sandy ground, dusting herself off as she did so. She took a dulled look at what was once a mighty pillar, now degraded to a heaping pile of sandstone. It was a struggle for their fallen stallion to get back up on his feet. Pain was numb and it throbbed throughout her entire body and her senses seemed to be dead. But it was then when she saw him, still listless where he lay—

She broke into a run, a cry in her throat.

 _“Puss!_ Are you—”

He pushed himself up from the floor, himself panting, striking a palm out to the air to halt her, _I will stand on my own._

She faltered. “…alright?”

He turned to look at her.

He stood up, one paw steadying his hat in place. Turned his head to the sky, which was now slowly being tainted by the grief of night itself.

And tiredly, he smiled.

“I think we have done enough travelling today.”

Dulcinea cast her gaze upon the sky as well. She wasn’t the only one consciously trying to ignore that question that continued to dangle so leisurely from the very edge of the proverbial cliff.

She sighed. “Yeah.”

_…what now?_

* * *

If the Scimitar had eyes, they probably would have bulged out of their sockets in utter outrage because he thought that that teacup was actually _cute_.

“YOU _IDIOTS!_ ”

Said idiots had to scramble away to keep from being hit by the soaring teacup that smashed against the wall and fell to the ground in a thousand smithereens. The wolves looked at their seething master in disbelief, but some of them were too ashamed that they could only bear to look down at their feet.

The china saucer rattled against the force when a frustrated Evil Puss slammed a fist down the desk.

“What do you mean you _can’t_ follow them?!”

For a moment, none of the wolves dared speak up. They were all gathered at the town mayor’s office that Evil Puss had since claimed his own, and the wolves looked for all the world like teenage boys getting sentenced to detention by their school principal after having accidentally poked a hole through their old science teacher’s windshield with a misguided baseball.

“Their…their stallion, sir,” reported the beta wolf, finally giving in to the nudges of his brothers when no one still dared speak up. “They was simply too fast fo’ us to chase, they was! It was impossible.”

Evil Puss didn’t even acknowledge what was said, because he kept pacing, pacing, _pacing_ , back and forth and back and forth, the sound of his boots tapping against the floor getting more and more maddening by the moment. He clutched at the fur on his forehead, clearly stressed out as all the while he kept muttering and muttering and _muttering_ the same thing under his breath—

_This is bad._

The Scimitar observed the pacing swordsman with mild indifference. Just a bit earlier, Evil Puss was beyond delighted to know that the San Lorenzans were attempting to escape again, just so he could toy with Puss in Boots and his weedle feewings by putting up that cheap come-and-kill-me-you-coward charade.

Now, he was thundering with anger.

Understandably so, yes, but all the Scimitar wanted was a smooth transition between _moods_ , please? Trying to keep up with his new wielder’s mercurial temper was honestly beginning to drive him out of his mind.

The Alpha wolf exchanged a look with his brother before finally deciding to step up. There was a look of genuine concern in the wolf leader’s eyes when he looked at his master.

“Would you…like me to assemble a search party, then, sir?” he offered. “With all due respect, you’re probably thinking that they’ve gone far away now, but they actually might just be around. Their friends are still here, so they wouldn’t go that far! We would scour the Western Desert, find your prisoners until they’re caught, bring them back here in chains—”

_“NO!”_

This latest outburst sent all the grown wolves one step backwards in fright of the cat that mastered their pack. Even the Alpha wolf’s enthusiasm in trying to help wilted at his master’s latest, harsh verbal lambaste.

The Scimitar thought that all this drama was ridiculous. Just before he finally stepped up to quell the tension like a sensible adult, however—

Evil Puss keeled in pain. It happened all too suddenly—it was as if an invisible rug was yanked out from under him because he just fell there, on his knees, his paws grasping at the carpet, heaving and gasping like fish, all while muttering nearly unintelligible words under his breath— _stop it, STOP it, I don’t NEED this right now, you bloody old fool!_ The wolves just looked at each other, helpless. The one time this happened and they’d panicked over him, they were punished and went without food for three days. Evil Puss had made it very clear that being helped and pitied like some pathetic stray kitten disgusted him.

If the Scimitar had eyes, he would have rolled them like a real pro and won himself the gold medal in the eye-rolling Olympics. Much as he loved Evil Puss being his handler, this side of him was pretty wretched, and it was what made him weak. He stood without conviction and his castle of arrogance was built on desert sand, too often saying one thing but meaning another. Bragging that he was the controller of the chessboard, when in fact he was nothing more than just another pawn of a true master.

But of course, it’s not that the Scimitar wasn’t enjoying this lousy show play out before him. All this drama made life so much better for him after all, rather than getting stuck in a rock like a bloody parody of the freaking Excalibur.

Finally, Evil Puss was done with his little internal torment. His glare could’ve cut through ice when he threw it at his wolves. Immediately he pushed himself from the ground and turned his back to them with all the calm of the world, acting like he wasn’t just being suffocated by an invisible force on the floor, like, five seconds ago.

“I have a job for you.” Cold, straightforward, emotionless. The Scimitar really wished he had eyes so he could roll them like hell.

“Search for the prisoners?” suggested Sarge.

“No,” responded Evil Puss. “I want you to free someone…from his glorified cage.”

The wolves looked at each other, confused.

“Where?”

When Evil Puss finally said the dreaded words that answered their question, even the Scimitar would have blinked in utter shock and alarm if he had his own pair of eyes.

Because what. The. _Hell?!_

The wolves, of course, knew nothing about what was just said.

“But we have no idea where that is, sir!”

Evil Puss took a step to turn and face them. And the moment he did—

—was the moment that lightning struck them all in the eye, blinding them and sending them to their knees in pain. As the wolves shut their eyes closed and clutched at their suddenly ringing heads, the image of a prison tower looming high above the thundering clouds flashed within their mind’s eye—

Before the pain finally stopped gripping at their brains, leaving them heaving and gasping for breath, and finding themselves scattered on the floor like fallen soldiers in a war. The Alpha wolf looked up and realized that his master wasn’t there anymore—Evil Puss was instead on their far right, standing by the door that led to his chambers.

But just before he stepped inside, he gave them one last withering look.

“It’s going to be a dangerous journey, so gather as much as you can from your army and go. _Now!_ ”

The wolves staggered to their feet, and, shakily bowing before their master, finally left the mayor’s office to obey their master’s orders.

If the Scimitar had eyes, he would have kept gaping at Evil Puss because where he’s sending his soldiers was already clinically _insane_.

“ _Seriously?!_ ” The magical sword lifted himself from where he lay, moving quickly through the air to follow Evil Puss into his moonlit room. “You’re sending them _there?_ That’s not just _dangerous_ —that’s _mad!_   Wouldn’t you rather have them search for your missing prisoners instead of getting them all instantly slaughtered?! I heard there’s a red Sheev—”

Evil Puss rolled his eyes. “The soldiers wouldn’t be able to catch those two nonetheless, so why not just send them off to complete that godforsaken contract already? That old sorcerer’s beginning to get impatient and…forceful.”

The Scimitar had heard about their history for like a million times and he would _not_ hear that deal-with-a-devil-boo-hoo-hoo story again. So he decided to cross the line and get it straight—

“Then what _is_ your plan then, sit around here and mope?”

“No.” He walked across the dark of his room and toward the light pouring from his open window where a lone, blooming rose stood on a pot. “Rather than force Puss in Boots and Dulcinea to come to San Lorenzo, I will just lure them back here…”

And as he approached his window, there his two dolls were, both laid side-by-side, just beside the potted plant.

His eyes glowed a malevolent red when he picked up one of the button-eyed dolls. He held the doll aloft so that the moonlight cast shadows upon its silken lilac skirt and its big, beady blue eyes. He smirked.

“…and have fun while I’m at it.”

The doll was Dulcinea.

* * *

“Oh, Puss! Where are you taking me?”

They walk up the steps of a slope, and Dulcinea, smiling widely and unable to keep the excitement to herself, had her eyes closed behind Puss’ paws. She couldn’t even remember how this started in the first place—all she knows is that she was just quietly sitting in the empty orphanage, reading her book as usual, when he suddenly came in excitedly and took her by the paw and whispered sweet things into her ear that made her giggle like a little girl. He is taking her to a surprise, he said—something that shall take her breath away, he said…something he’d prepared just for her, he said. And my, how bubbly it makes her stomach feel, to think that he’d been hiding something like this from her all along!

“Puss!” she says, and she feels her whiskers stick straight out—she is getting a little bit frustrated at having her anticipation unrewarded for such a seemingly long amount of time. How she yearns to abandon the black, and open her eyes already to behold whatever magnificence he prepared for her!

His voice drops into deep, mellow tones, far octaves below from his normal one, when finally, finally, he whispers the magic words into her ear.

“You may open your eyes now, sweetheart.”

 _Sweetheart_ …her heart jumps out of her chest and does a little happy dance. That was the first time he’d ever called her that, and honestly, she…likes it. She feels his paws leave her eyes, and Dulcinea, biting her lip to keep herself from smiling too widely, finally opened her eyes.

And the sight before her is like nothing she’d ever imagined.

A frown settles on her face, her eyebrows crinkle in bafflement, the wagon of her excited emotions is set tumbling out and over the hill and crashing on the ground in a pathetic wreckage—her heart is empty of the anticipation that had fevered her just seconds earlier and suddenly, she doesn’t know what to feel.

_The…crater?_

Confused, she turns on her heel to look at him, the question ready on her tongue, _this must be some kind of mistake._ But the words died in her mouth at the sight before her.

He is fingering the red feather on his newly-replaced hat, having already thrown the yellow-feathered one onto the ground like it was nothing to him but filth.

Realization dawns on her wide, alarmed eyes. “ _You…!_ ”

He chuckles, low, until it grows into a cackle. He snaps his sword from his belt, points it at her, forces her to back away, take a step until the rocks crack and fall into the deep, boiling bottom of the fiery red crater—

“ _Such_ a naïve fool.”

Evil Puss thrusts his sword to her chest and Dulcinea, in her desperate attempt to evade, is forced to take another step back, but then her heels find a weak spot, and she _slips_ —

And she falls—

And she screams.

* * *

Dulcinea shot up from her sleep, held her heaving chest, her breaths loud and short and rapid, her head suddenly dizzy until her mind couldn’t fathom where the starry black sky stopped and the desert horizon began—like she’d been plunged in the dark depths of water for such a long time, and only now did she manage to get plunged out into the surface to just finally take a breath.

His voice still echoed in her brain, like he was sitting just right beside her, whispering his deathly words right into her ear—and she couldn’t help but shudder.

_“Such a naïve fool.”_

She closed her eyes, let her body land limply against a sleeping Babieca’s sturdy torso, and held her forehead with a paw, as if to ward off a rising headache. What _is_ it with these dreams? It was only the second time, yes, but she feared the third might just do the charm. Or curse. With all the magic she’d encountered in her recent life, who knew? These Evil Puss-centric dreams were honestly beginning to creep her out—after all, he _had_ said that he _will_ haunt her until he’d gotten her murdered.

_“Surrender him now, Dulcinea. Or I’ll haunt you, even in your dreams…”_

Of course, it might have only been a stupid coincidence. They were probably nothing. Yes. They probably didn’t mean anything at all, and she was merely thinking over things _too much_ that it had begun to infect her very imagination and culminated themselves into unsettling nightmares. Yes. That had to be it.

But…just _no_. So many crazy stuff had been taking place that it was difficult to tell possibility from impossibility anymore, what with their gang’s recent battle for the Blind King’s deposition in the Netherworld and, roughly ten minutes later, the Emperor-King’s reign of terror over San Lorenzo. Everything was spiralling out of control too quickly. And, what with their recent failure of a rebellion, things were only expected to get worse. Normally she’d be very optimistic about the future, but her brain had been muddled past the point of normalcy that now, she just couldn’t help but worry if any of this will ever lead to an end.

She shook her head, willing her thoughts away, mind now directed on Puss—speak of the proverbial devil. Where _was_ he anyway? She sat straighter, looked around, and found him nowhere. There was only the crackling bonfire, that enormous boulder, a vast, empty desert land drenched in darkness, that heaving pile of fallen sandstone column not too far away, and the scattered rays of the starlit sky. The moon was bright, though it was but a sliver of waning crescent—soon to disappear, perhaps by morning, perhaps in the next few hours, only time could tell.

Still no sign of anyone anywhere. Where _was_ Puss? She would have asked Babieca—not that the stallion could speak, but he was all that she had—but he was deeply asleep, and she would hate to wake him up, not after the long exhausting hours he’d spent travelling them as far away from San Lorenzo as possible. She couldn’t believe that ever in her life would she have fallen so far as to say this to herself, but…

The further they were from home, the safer they were.

She observed that night had fallen, and someone—Puss, obviously—had set up a fire that should last them through the night. But where has he gone?

The last rays of the sun over the horizon had already been largely overcome by the vast, dominating darkness, littered by a thousand glittering stars. It was bitterly cold out here in the desert, she realized, when she shivered and her paws unconsciously found her own shoulders so she could hug herself. She walked closer to the fire and sat beside it, finding comfort in the gentle warmth of the bright orange flames. Her thoughts once more dominated her mind with nothing but silence in her company.

Until she heard a set of boots walking towards her.

Her heart rose. _Puss!_

But her heart dropped just right after. _Or…_

_Was he?_

She didn’t like the feeling of alarm that suddenly took over her chest, as if blanketing it with a forest of thorns.

“Puss?” she called out, “is that you?” She observed him walking out of the darkness and towards her, carrying a bag of something with him.

“Dulcinea!” His eyes lit up when he spotted her by the fire. “You are awake!” He ran to sit beside her, and immediately then began to rummage through the contents of his bag. “And just in time!”

She observed him for a moment, and nothing seemed a bit too out of place. Outwardly, that is. Same hat, same contractionless sentences, no out of character quirks…

She didn’t like having to be so suspicious, but she still had to make sure.

“What do you fear, Puss?”

He stopped at that sudden question, thrown from completely out of the blue, his arms frozen mid-search in rummaging through his sack.

“ _What?_ Fear? Pfft.” And here he stood, fisting at the air and bravely puffing his chest out, as if he was too bloated with arrogance that his physical body couldn’t possibly contain it. “I fear _nothing._ I do not even know the meaning of the word _fear_. I have never even heard of this noun that indicates a distressing emotion aroused by impending danger, whether the threat is real or imagined. Ha! Why would you ask such a ridiculous question to begin with?”

“Easy, Puss,” Dulcinea said, her eyes softening as she finally saw his inner him come to the surface. “You’re being too defensive now.”

He gasped, like he was mortally wounded. “ _Defensive?_ I am not being defensive—it is you who are being offensive! That accusation is baseless, Dulcinea. I do not fear bees—I dislike them. Dis. _Like!_ There is a difference!”

She did not notice the edge in his voice, wavering as if it teetered perilously close to falling off a cliff. Instead, she rolled her eyes. It was…nice, she thought. To talk like this. With him.

Again.

“You’re the one who’s accusing yourself, Puss! I didn’t even _say_ the word bees.”

He blinked, astounded. She…had a point there.

A tinge irritated at having someone outsmart his razor-sharp intellect, he sighed exasperatedly. “Why are we talking about this now, Dulcinea?”

“Because,” she said, calmly folding her paws over her skirt, “there’s a bee behind you.”

“What?!”Puss moved so quickly that she didn’t even _see_ him move until he was hiding just behind her, cowering from an invisible attacker even as he drew his sword out like he was a brave hero or something.

“Back, villainous villain, or face the wrath of Puss in Boots! How _dare_ you scare Dulcinea like so!”

Dulcinea burst into laughter at that, the dissolving tension leaving her relieved. This was Puss alright.

Puss was looking at her, an expression of shock and outrage painted all over his face as it quickly dawned on him that there was no bee after all.

“Dulcinea!” he said, each syllable of her name emphasized by righteous indignation. “There is no bee? And you are…laughing at me! How dare you take advantage of my potent dislike of bees? I thought you did not approve of lying!”

It was an agony for her to try smothering her laughter into as minimal a giggle as possible. “Lying?” she eventually managed to cough out, “That’s not… _lying_. That’s…that’s joking. By pretending!”

Puss was not amused.

“Everyone else calls it lying! This, I do not like!” The anger from his voice was not dispelled even as every second passed away. The smile on Dulcinea’s face slowly faded. With growing unease, she watched him vent his anger away, pacing back and forth as restlessly as a toppled pendulum. “And I hardly think this is the time to be playing pranks. Of all people in the world, it is you who I least expected to take advantage of my dislike of bees!”

Her eyes widened as the thought of what she’d done descended upon her. Did he…think her cruel? She suddenly felt terrible. Her stomach twisted. Doubt began to seep into her bones. The two of them were getting along so nicely mere moments ago. Their conversation had begun so pleasantly—how could she have dared let her doubt spoil it all?

Cheese and crackers. Even from so far away, Evil Puss’ wanton lust for discord continued to haunt them both.

“Puss…I’m sorry. I only wanted to make sure—”

The rest of the words were arrested when Puss suddenly whirled around at her, his glare pinning her in her place, his face expressive of outright incredulity.

“What has gotten _into_ you, Dulcinea?”

Her throat closed up at the furious accusation.

 _Oh, for the love of San Lorenzo_ , she wanted to retort. It was only a _bee_ , Puss.

What has gotten into _you?_

But she held her tongue from the tart remarks. Puss could get a little…emotionally compromised whenever threatened—whenever _San Lorenzo_ was threatened—and Dulcinea knew she had to be careful and gentle with her words. The crashing waves of the ocean hadn’t been kind enough, and Puss in Boots was enough of a shipwreck already.

“Don’t…get mad.” She tried to meet his eyes, but immediately looked away. It was one thing standing at the sidelines and another thing entirely when you stood on the opposite side of his sword. She’d never realized how intimidating Puss could be with that stare of his when he wanted to. She berated herself for feeling so apprehensively—she had to remind herself that this was _not_ Evil Puss, that this was her _friend_ , that there was no need for her to act like she was suddenly that cornered prisoner she’d been back at the treasure house.

She cleared her throat, faced him again. No need to conjure unpleasant memories. This was her friend, and he was hurt, he was _hurting_ , and _he_ was the one who needed to be reminded that as cruel as the world may have been to them all, kind people still existed, and they were there to understand.

“I had to make sure it was you, Puss,” she said. “I’m sorry.”

The words were warm against the cold desert night, and they were slow to sink in.

But they eventually did.

“…oh.” The tension seemed to evaporate from him right then and there, only to be immediately replaced by sudden feelings of self-loathing and guilt. “Oh. Well…well-played, my friend.”

The two of them were silent after that, unsure how to repair the broken threads of conversation but not really willing to break the silence. Puss sat a respectful distance away from Dulcinea, yet not so far as to signal aloofness. Every once in a while, either of them would open their mouths as if to say something, but would immediately shut it close, held back by fear or doubt or something else. The ever consuming bonfire continued to dance aflame, setting their shadows frolicking about, the wood crackling and cracking at their pensive silence every now and then.

Eventually, Puss had had enough of his ruminations. With a sigh, he extended an arm to reach for his bag of spoils to rummage through the contents once again, just as he had been doing when he’d first arrived.

Dulcinea immediately leapt at the first chance of a conversation.

“So, um. What have you got there, Puss?”

“Food,” he said, smiling at her as he revealed a small loaf of bread in one paw and a jug in another. “And water.”

She just then realized how hungry she was. How long was it since she’d last had her cup of leche and an actual, satisfying dinner? A year ago in Pajuna’s cantina, she realized with a horror.

“Oh, goodie!” She inched closer to him to reach for the bread he offered and immediately began munching. She swallowed, took another bite, and munched it again. Another swallow, and it was then when she seemed to realize something. She looked at Puss with mild surprise.

“Where did you get them though?”

Puss blinked, pausing as recent events unfurled themselves in his mind.

_“Hola, filthy scheming degenerates! Did you steal your bag of spoils from someone?”_

_The thieves’ eyes go wide. They immediately scamper to the opposite direction, tumbling over their feet and screaming all the way._

_“It’s Puss in Boots! Run, run!”_

_But they stop, frightened, when a sword smacks the ground cleanly in front of them, immediately halting them from their tracks. They are forced to look back at the smug-looking gato whose boots crunch gingerly against the sandy desert ground with each step he takes toward them._

_“Please do not hurt us!”_

_Puss feigns surprise. “What? No, señores, what a ridiculous proposition! Do not be frightened, I am not Puss in Boots! Puss in Boots has been dead long over the year, has he not?”_

_The thieves scratch their heads, look to each other uncertainly, then nod collectively as if to reassure themselves._

_“Oh, right.”_

_“Yeah, okay.”_

_“Sure, why not.”_

_“Then let us start over again,” says a satisfied Puss. “Hola, filthy scheming degenerates! Did you steal your bag of spoils from someone?”_

_“Why, yes! Why’d you ask?”_

_Puss grins._

_“You dare steal the noble steed of Puss in Boots? Back, villains, and face me, Puss, in Boots…your demise!”_

_The thieves blink to each other. “What steed?”_

_Puss points behind him, at a sleeping Babieca by the fire._

_The thieves’ eyes go wide. “What? But we weren’t stealing your—YAARGH!”_

_Needless to say, the three thieves ended up as a heaping pile of flesh._

_“I thought…Puss in Boots…was dead…” they mutter to themselves as a triumphant Puss dragged their stolen bag of spoils away with him._

Dulcinea blinked.

“So…let me get this straight. The thieves tried to steal Babieca…and they were bringing blankets and food and water…and you were…forced…to get their items from them?”

“Eh…yes?”

The disagreement was clear in her eyes. “That wasn’t very nice.”

“ _Thieves_ are not very nice.” He waived it away with an uncomfortable chuckle. Puss had his own past of thievery after all, and that can of worms was not exactly a can he would like to open in front of Dulcinea. Or anyone else, for that matter. Let him alone bear the sin, because—

“What is important,” he said, matter-of-factly, “is that you are able to sustain yourself.”

As if on cue, his own stomach growled a violent protest, an esurient sound in the silence of the night.

Dulcinea rolled her eyes, and without looking down at the bread in her paws, she broke it into two, mindlessly offering the larger of them to the swordsman sitting beside her.

He ignored her offer, simply looking straight through the fire as if the heat of the orange-yellow flames fascinated him so much.

She frowned and nudged him with it.

“Puss…” she said, her tone scolding. “Take this.”

He stubbornly stared straight ahead. “I am not hungry. Go ahead! I cannot possibly let a lady sacrifice.”

What on _Earth?_ His chivalry was a charming little thing, wasn’t it.

She dropped the heel of her shoe onto his boot.

 _“_ OW! _Fine!_ Give me that!”

Dulcinea laughed as she let him snatch the bread from her. He averted his eyes from her and took a bite out of his bread in mock-irritation, chewing as indignantly as he possibly could.

She welcomed the playful atmosphere and relished in it while it lasted. Moments like this these days were few and far in between and she better not take it for granted even if they were still practically stuck in the middle of a standstill.

The aura of frivolity was quick to melt away, however. Even Puss eventually had to surrender himself to the loudness of his thoughts against the desert’s deafening silence, breaking it with—

“I…” He gulped. Puss in Boots was not one for admitting mistakes. And humility. Puss and Boots and humility never got along at all.

But he managed.

“I apologize for having yelled at you, Dulcinea.”

She looked at him, a little surprised.

He looked away, a lot ashamed. “I do not know what had come over me.”

Dulcinea took one look at her half-eaten bread, another at the cat beside her. She then edged closer to him, close enough so she could put a comforting paw on his shoulder. She felt Puss tense up beneath her palm, and he turned his head to look at her, his eyes surprised at the physical contact.

“Don’t worry about it. I started it, so it’s my fault.”

He snorted. “You were merely being clever—do not apologize for that! I, however, was a…a…a jerk,” he chuckled, unused to using such vulgar terms yet feeling the sting of throwing rotten tomatoes at himself very appropriately placed, “for erupting in mindless anger.”

He tossed the remaining crumbs of bread in his paws into the fire.

“It’s okay,” assured Dulcinea, her voice as sweet and gentle as the mellow tones of the cither. With resolute determination, she ignored the ever-present whisper of the detrimental words _why bother_ , because once she listened to it, it would be her demise. Once she gave up, once they gave up, what they had left would fall apart until nothing was left at all. She had to keep believing that it will be alright; she had to stay strong, and if not for herself, then…

Then for him.

“It’s okay,” she assured him again and again, “it’s okay. It _will_ be okay, I promise. You’re just…” Her eyes wandered from his bloodshot eyes down to observe his slightly trembling paws, clutching at the dusty leather of his boots. Before he could notice that she noticed though, she cleared her throat, brought her eyes back up again to look at him.

“You’re just restless.” No surprise there. Trembling paws, bloodshot eyes, unstable mood swings—plus that problematic tendency to attack random thieves, all being yanked from deep within to be flung out to the surface where it shattered into pieces, left raw and bare and vulnerable to everybody else who could see. Yes, they were smack dab in the middle of a little situation involving a vengeful villain who was actually his evil twin who might actually bring about the end of the world, but Puss needed to _calm down._

“Why don’t you try to sleep first?” she suggested, hoping there would be no further argument. “I’ll keep a lookout, don’t worry.”

He pressed his eyes into the nook between his thumb and index finger, as if by that act alone he could press the rising stress down.

Of course, she’d been too optimistic to hope for no arguments.

“How can you even think of rest at such a disastrous time, Dulcinea?”

“Well…” She turned her head up to face the sky, closed her eyes as if to recite a rhyme. “‘Though trouble and strife wait ahead,’” she then quoted placidly, “’you must face the road with a calm head.’” Satisfied with her recitation, she looked at him again, a knowing smile in her eyes.

“The wisdom of the book.”

Because one of them had to keep their head here.

“This is not possible,” he replied, getting up from his crossed legs so he could proceed to restless pacing in front of the fire. “We have to form a plan of attack,” he told the crackling flames. “How do we defeat the Evil Emperor? How do we free San Lorenzo?” He turned to her. “There are two of us. Surely—“

A neigh of complaint erupted from the side to cut him off, and they looked to see Babieca having stirred from his faux sleep to glare daggers of protest at his leather-clad rider. Puss sent him an apologetic nod, peaceably raising both paws into the air at the stallion’s direction as if surrendering to an arrest.

“Three—I am sorry, my friend. Surely,” he continued, “we make enough of a formidable team! Yes? Yes?” He seemed desperate to fish for an affirmative, but just as a hesitant Dulcinea had been about to respond—

“We can take on a whole town of wolves if we simply go all out!” Back to restless pacing. “I definitely should, and will. Yes,” he nodded to himself, suddenly reassured, “this seems like a most executable plan. We shall rush in, do swordy stuff, and hope—“ he drew out his sword from his belt—

“—for—“

He struck at an imaginative foe—

“— _the best!_ ”

He quickly spun around in place so he could strike forward again, but his overused wrist had lost control of his sword the moment he had turned. The sword flew from his paw, and by the time he forwarded his return strike, the fencer was already disarmed of his foil.

Instead, he heard his sword strike the enormous boulder from behind him, the metallic twang unsettlingly punctuating his supposedly assuring speech for San Lorenzo’s freedom.

He was panting under his breath. His green eyes glowed under the shadow of the long sweep of his hat. He was still, unmoving even after seconds since he had posed in his offensive fighting stance.

And Dulcinea was watching the entire thing with growing disquietude.

“Puss…” She spoke as slowly as if she were treading the water, carefully assessing whether or not its depths would yank at her and drown her down. “It will…help you. If you just stop for a moment.”

“You do not _understand_ , Dulcinea,” he said, exasperated not at her, but at the universe and the mess of a conspiracy it wove against him. “I must do this. For the people of San Lorenzo.”

She bit her lip, looked down, and considered his words.

 _I must do this,_ he said.

_For the people of San Lorenzo._

“And…” She stopped fidgeting with her fingers so she could look up at him, though timidly. “…and maybe…”

 _For the people_ , he often stressed, _of San Lorenzo!_

“And…maybe a little for you?”

He stopped pacing, whirled to face her, outraged.

“No! I have sworn to protect them! And they need me!” He stopped. “They _need_ me, Dulcinea,” he said, a waver now in his whispering voice, “in a way…I have never been needed before.”

What in San Lorenzo happened in that fight against Evil Puss to have himself reduced to this self-loathing mess? He’d already felt like an utter failure for unknowingly leaving San Lorenzo in a year, but his defeat in that swordfight against the Evil Emperor must have been the final straw—at last pushing him off the cliff and sending him screaming down into the darkness, down to his demise.

Puss sighed, turned away. “You could never understand.”

But before he fell too far out of her reach—

A white paw was quickly able to catch him just in time.

He froze, shocked yet again by the contact. Dulcinea squeezed his paw as she got up from the ground.

She refused to let go. “I _do_ understand.”

He turned. Looked into her eyes. Completely aware that their paws were linked, and Dulcinea was _not_ shying away from him, she was _not_ averse to him at all, she was _not_ disgusted with him after all, even after all he had done.

“But…the thing is…” She took a breath.

“You don’t… have to, you know.”

He looked at her, furrowed his brow, cocked his head to the side, confused.

_What do you mean?_

“To what?”

She knew she was going to regret this. But she also knew that no matter how unkind she felt the words were, she had to be completely honest with herself because keeping up a lie would kill her first before anything else. She took a breath, braced herself for it, and did her best to look at him in the eye, if only to pull a mask of confidence—

And blurted it.

“To always have to be our protector.”

…but as soon as the words were out, she immediately felt like reining them back because they felt so _wrong_. Puss stared at her incredulously, and suddenly it was Dulcinea who couldn’t stand to have him look at her like that. There was a sort of relief from having her hidden dark thoughts finally purged from her system to keep them from brewing into something even nastier, but there was also the shame that flooded her senses now that Puss knew her for the selfish person she really was.

Selfish, because instead of letting San Lorenzo have his sacrifice, she wanted to pull him back from the edge and tell him to _listen to me, Puss, you don’t_ have _to, you know._

But what was so very wrong in trying to keep him from hurting himself any _further?_

Puss wasn’t saying anything, and Dulcinea wished so fervently to the stars that she could just melt into a puddle right then and there. She regretted ever even speaking in the first place. But no…no, that wasn’t the right way to say it—she didn’t _regret_ saying the words, but she did feel guilty for feeling this way. As if holding Puss back from sacrificing himself for the sake of San Lorenzo was a wrong and heartless and cruel thing to desire. As if wanting him to be _safe_ was a wrong thing to desire. Because when was it, exactly, that she had begun to so instinctively, unthinkingly, _subconsciously_ choose _him_ …

Over the rest of San Lorenzo?

Puss drew back. Slowly. Calculatingly.

Then burst out laughing. A stunned Dulcinea could only stare at him, unblinking, confused— _What? Didn’t he hear what I just said?_ He was even slapping his knees for good measure.

“Oh, Dulcinea,” he said when he’d finally calmed himself down, “You crack me up! Why would you, of all people, even suggest such a thing? And now, for all times, when San Lorenzo needs me the most! Are you not the one who bound me to this duty in the first place? If you recall our first encounter, right after a certain someone destroyed the protection spell of San Lorenzo…whose name I do not remember,” he said, chuckling uncomfortably at her stare before swiftly moving on, “I insisted that you leave the town before the villains of the outside world came to pillage your treasure. You had disagreed, of course, firmly telling me that I must stay and be your protector until the day the spell is restored, until what needs to be righted is righted. _You_ were the one who bound me to a duty of protecting San Lorenzo, Dulcinea, and now you are saying that I do not…have to? _Please_. I cannot just abandon the duty that I have sworn upon my sword that very day. Because ever since then…”

He took a pause. Sighed, and then collapsed to sit on the desert sand.

“Ever since then, it has been my life’s one and only duty. Until…”

He turned away so that the light of the flames couldn’t reach his eyes.

“Until this duty had grown into something more.”

Dulcinea said nothing. She herself sat again to the ground, but this time sitting right beside him, drawing her knees up to her chin and hugging her legs close to herself. She stared into the fire contemplatively, letting her pensive silence be his own.

“Something _more_ than duty,” he continued, once she’d settled right beside him. “Something…more binding. Than duty.”

Dulcinea perked up at that. “Oh. I’ve heard you say that before.”

“Yes,” he agreed, a smile on his face, turning towards the light again so that he could look at her. “Because I think of it often. It is as if…something…” He put a paw to his chest, his eyes introspective. “A fatal tumour, perhaps…has grown inside my…chest area…”

Dulcinea then couldn’t help but giggle at his ridiculous way of substituting words.

“You mean, in your heart?”

He brightened. “Yes! In my heart! And it…tugs at me, you know? It gives me joy yet it gives me distress, and it prods me to think of San Lorenzo above everything else, even myself. It is a feeling…that I do not understand. Enough to bother me in my sleep during the night, trying to figure out what to call it!”

The flames danced on Dulcinea’s blue eyes as she stared straight right through them. She hugged her knees closer. Her fingers curled into fists. Her face remained impassive, but the emotions in her heart kept pounding and pounding, threatening to shatter through the fragile glass any moment now.

“And you…sometimes feel guilty for their suffering…even though you know you aren’t completely at fault? And it makes you…want to sacrifice, even if that choice is against everything you’ve ever believed in?”

Puss snapped his fingers triumphantly. “Yes! That is it! Exactly! So does this mean that you feel the same way? Are we perhaps ill? Then, what is the name of this deplorable disorder that I may find the medication to slay it!”

There was incredulous laughter in her eyes when she lifted her chin from her knees so that she could look at him in utter disbelief.

_“Slay?”_

“Yes! I—“

“ _Puss._ ” She put a paw on his shoulder to keep him from exaggerating the dramatics. “What you’re feeling right now? It’s _not_ a disease. It’s…” Her features softened.

“It’s love.”

Puss backed away from her as if he’d just been burned by fire. “ _What?_ Ridiculous! As a nomad and a loner, I have learned _never_ to get too attached to anyone or anything. And what more of _love?_ If attachment could hurt so, then how much more pain can something deeper than that cause? It is a liability that holds you back. A disease that ravages the mind. A weakness of the heart!”

A horrified Dulcinea was strongly compelled to disagree to all of that. “ _What?_ No! Love isn’t any of those things, Puss—why would you even think that?”

“Evil Puss said—“

What in the _world?_

 “ _Forget_ what Evil Puss said! You’re letting him call weak what you find your strength in, and that isn’t something I would stand for!” She gripped his shoulders so she could make him look at her and for once, just _once_ , actually _listen_.

As Puss stared back at her, however, his green eyes wide, Dulcinea sighed, loosening the grip of her fingers on his shoulders. But even as the fury waned, her determination to keep hauling him up from his depressive hole remained intact.

They were stuck in the same hole, after all, and the only way for her to get out of it was to get _him_ out of it too.

“Look,” she started over again, “you’re _more_ than this, Puss. Don’t let him belittle you, because…” Her voice cracked. “Because I _can’t_ keep watching you destroy yourself like this, okay? You keep denying it, you keep on waiving it aside, you keep on running away from it, because you don’t know that the first step to facing your problems is admitting to yourself what _is_. When you love something, or someone, you would sacrifice for them. You are choosing them over everything else, even over your own self. Look at me now, and tell me…tell me again that that kind of power is a weakness. That’s bravery, that’s strength, that’s love. And when you say that your duty to San Lorenzo has grown into something deeper than that?”

Her paws slid down from his shoulders so she could clutch at his paws instead.

“It means you love San Lorenzo, Puss.”

An astonished Puss could only look at her, his mouth open with a half-formed response, but with no sound coming out of it anyway. Eventually he seemed to simply give up, unable to retort, to counter, or to deny anything of what she said, because surprisingly enough…he found it all true.

Dulcinea’s paws were in his own, and she held him, so sincerely and openly that Puss suddenly could not help but squeeze back, gently, softly, tenderly bringing her paws to his chest as if to pull her ever closer.

“Perhaps, then,” he said, “just perhaps…I _have_ gotten carried away. And fell, in…”

Dulcinea took a breath.

She dared say.

“Love?”

His eyes were as startlingly green as ever when he looked at her, a thousand emotions blazing from within.

And finally, “Yes.”

Their pounding hearts demanded no more words. As the fire burned and the wood cracked and crackled, amidst the stars and the pitch black night resting upon the cold wide desert, the two lovers slowly leaned to one another, entwining their fingers as if keep each other close and to never let go, because the moment they will is the moment the entire world shatters—

And as their eyes flutter close, just before their lips touched…

A brutal earthquake tore across the land.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m already terrible by ending this chapter like that, but I did not intend to skip three weeks of updating! My best friend Persephone (she’s my laptop) decided to die and refused to choke out the three chapters I’ve already written. After a week of crying and moping around and blaming the universe for the cruel fate that has befallen me, I accepted facts and began rewriting this and the other two in my li’l bro’s PC instead. I’ll back up me files from now on. T.T Thankfully I wrote the story’s chapter-by-chapter outline in a notebook, so don’t worry, all is not lost, this story is still on the move, if only with slower updates from now on, if anyone but me’s still even interested. xD Though I can’t guarantee anything, I’ll do my best to get back to my weekly sched by writing like hell. Everything for San Lorenzo!!
> 
> Just to clarify for MysticFeathers (btw, u r AWESOME <3) and all who might be wondering, no, this will NOT end the same way as the original series. Even if everything seems to point otherwise, keep hoping, because I won’t let you and myself down. (At least, I do my best to not write crap and mess up.) One thing I can assure you, though, is that I worked my ass off trying to satisfy my dissatisfied sense of justice with the series’ depressing ending. I know you know what I’m talking about :( and that I’m not alone here screaming WHY, SINO? WHY??? 
> 
> I feel like I need to say that this story, slow as it is, does have a plot. It’s just not rearing its big ugly head yet. ;) So see y’all, maybe not next week, but I hope you’ll stick around till then!


	10. Here, Kitty Kitty...

_“Wee! Wee! Weeee—_ OW! _”_

“Ugh, Esme, child, _Dios mío_.”

The frenetic Señora Zapata scurried over and bent down to gingerly gather the suddenly silent Esme into her arms. The little girl was obviously trying, though failing, to keep up a façade of strength, but once she’d been able to climb up into Señora Zapata’s arms, she immediately surrendered to the sobs that then racked her entire diminutive form. She had tripped over her own little feet, tumbled, hit her head against one of the metal bars of the cage, and fell back to the hard, unforgiving floor on her rear. She got herself hurt. A little thing. But the señora—though she’d have to face a million Bloodwolves first and _die_ from the inebriation of the victory party right after _before_ she ever admitted to it—but the señora could never truly get a hold of herself whenever it was Esme who cried.

“I _told_ you, Esme—I t-told you.” And that was why she couldn’t keep the slight falter from her words when the usually iron-willed woman reprimanded the niñita for having happily jumped around like a frog in the midst of such a dangerous earthquake.

“Natural disasters are _not_ supposed to be enjoyed!”

Esme nodded weakly.

The mother’s heart ached painfully.

No child deserved this kind of horrible living condition, where _earthquakes_ have become the children’s twisted, twisted idea of amusement and fun. 

Señora Zapata protectively wrapped her hands around Esme’s small frame, closed her eyes tightly as she let her little girl’s head bury itself into the safety of her adoptive mother’s neck as the world dissolved into noise and turmoil around them.

Anger. Anger _roiled_ in the veins of the scary, grumpy woman who ran the shoe orphanage, of the woman who claimed _not_ to care— of the woman who was only scary if only to scare away the horrors that threatened _her_ children, of the woman who secretly woke up every midnight to check whether they were covered with blankets so they didn’t wake up and found themselves in a cold, dark, unforgiving world.

The entire San Lorenzan ménage was panicking, and though Señora Zapata wanted to wrap _all_ of her children in the safety of her arms, she despaired that she cannot.

_You will PAY for doing this to them, Evil Puss in the Boots._

She dipped her head into Esme’s hair and almost sobbed as the turmoil went on.

_For doing this to all of us._

“Earthquaaaaaake!” shrilled Igualdemontijo.

“Everybody,” cried Pajuna, “freak out!”

_“AAAAAAAHHH!”_

This is, like, totes ruining my beauty sleep! Ugh, and would you just— _ugh_ —get _off_ of me, dude!”

“MOMMY!” squealed Temeroso, who refused to let go of his tight grip on San Lorenzo’s resident—though thoroughly irritated—flying sphinx. “I miss my b-b- _barrels_...”

“D-Did you know that earthquakes are called so because they make the earth _quake?!_ ” asked the ever inquisitive Vina.

“ _What?!_ NO WAY! That doesn’t even make any— _oof!_ ” Toby was cut off when he was thrown off balance and had to grip at the bars of his cage to keep from falling over himself.

“Ugh!” said a reasonably angry Kid Pickles as he held tight on a bar of his cage and his pickle jar with his other hand. “This ain’t just a _quake_ anymore, Vina. It’s a freaking _monster_ of a—”

A shrill shriek cut through the air.

“NIGHT TERRORS! AHHHHHH!”

It was Artephius.

“ _Arty!_ ” The Duchess worriedly knelt beside Artephius and clutched her alchemist boyfriend’s cold, clammy hand, decidedly worried from his wild-eyed startle from sleep.

“D-Duchy?” His bleary eyes had trouble focusing on her face, on his surroundings, on what was happening. “Wha…huh… _huh?_ ”

“How did you even manage to sleep through the first few seconds of this entire freak show?!” blurted out an extremely agitated Eames.

Naturally, he was ignored.

“It’s just an earthquake, dear, don’t worry,” cooed Maldonna with the thick, soothing honey of her voice, though even the Duchess, fourth Eldritch Witch and once a mortal enemy of San Lorenzo, was emphatically getting worried about the frequency of these earthquakes and the intensity they seem to be gaining each time they unleashed their power upon the land. “Don’t you worry. It’s just an earthquake. I’m here, Arty, my deluded sugarpie. Mommy’s got you…”

“An…earthquake? Hmm…ah… _Ooh!_ ” Once the fog has cleared, Artephius certainly didn’t react the way as anticipated: instead of breaking down into worry about the state of San Lorenzo, he had thrown his thin arms around her suddenly blushing neck and was grinning up at her like the world’s sweetest idiot that he was. Perhaps the blush on the Duchess’ neck indicated her shyness at their sudden proximity, or perhaps it was an allergic reaction to Artephius’ body odour since he was really _not_ a fan of showering—regardless, nothing can possibly predict, especially whenever it came to this man.

“ _Yay!_ ” cheered Artephius. “It’s like—like having a romantic luxury cruise across seven seas, prevailing even through the harshest storms and the cruellest icebergs! Or wait...was it _five_ seas? I think it’s five.”

“THIS IS _NOWHERE_ NEAR A _ROMANTIC GETAWAY!!_ ” Cleevil’s eyes bulged out of her fear-stricken face as she screamed those last few words, frozen by panic as she clutched on the bars of her and Kid Pickles’ cage to keep standing on her two feet—even as the ground itself kept forcing her to fall, because there was _no way_ was she ever gonna give it up. “It’s _not_ a _yay_ , Artephius. _Definitely_ not. YAY!”

The earthquake was frighteningly severe. It was lasting longer than necessary, and it was absolutely nothing like they’d ever encountered in the past. The cages were actually moved to rattling against the ground like they weighed no more than toys. Despite this, however, San Lorenzo was determined to endure it just as they have endured many others, countless of times in the past. And though there were cracks in their will, and the fractures only grew and grew as the quake persisted, trying to break them, shatter them, to get them to give up—they still held tightly to each other, because it was all they could do. Artephius to Duchess, Toby to Vina, Esme to Mister Cubbie, Cleevil to Kid Pickles, a frightened Temeroso to a fairly appalled Sphinx, a happily oblivious Puss Dos to a clingy Eames—even Pajuna was holding Señora Zapata hoof-in-hand.

“Look,” breathed Pajuna as her eyes grew wide in alarm. Everybody followed her gaze and gasped when they saw that a crack had formed on the ground and was growing ever larger as the quake persisted, threatening to split the very earth in half, and it was crawling, crawling towards Toby’s cage.

A frightened Toby could only brace himself as the crack approached, its slow crawl picking up the pace, faster, faster, faster—

Then it stopped.

The quake stilled.

Upon the still yet breathless uncalm, silence fell over the Treasure House chamber like a silken veil.

“It’s...” Señora Zapata felt Esme shakily lift her head from the crook of her neck, and when the little girl spoke, her usually high-pitched enthusiastic voice was small and aquiver. “It’s o-over?”

As if they really did need the vocal reassurance that everything is alright, every San Lorenzan released the sigh of breath they’ve been holding as they collapsed to the ground in boneless relief.

A paralyzed Toby passed out before he even hit the ground, squeaking like a rubber ducky upon impact.

“These earthquakes are getting _worse_ ,” hissed a pissed Señora Zapata as she snatched her hand away from Pajuna’s hoof, having decided then and there that she was not going to stand this through for _forever_. She readjusted her embrace on Esme before continuing on, fixing an accusative glare at the Scottish cow across her. “I thought the next series of quakes are still due _next_ week!”

If Pajuna was offended, she let not an inkling of it spill into her words and actions when she crossed her arms over her chest and sharply bit back a retort. “Well, _obviously_ , the intervals are gettin’ shorter. More dangerous. More unpredictable. Ya can’t always point yer fingers on _me_ if my calculations get smashed to bits by these bleedin’ natural disasters!”

“This is a sign,” prophesied the Duchess, still holding onto Artephius, still struggling to bring her wits about her as she spoke. “Just as that blue Sheevrah warned us _months_ ago! Don’t you all think we should be doing _something_ about this? The earthquakes are getting serious. And we’re just sitting here, treating it like some sort of a joke!”

“Ha! _You_ tell _us_ , lady,” demanded a grumpy Kid Pickles. “It ain’t like we could just bust out of these pigsties and go fight an _earthquake_ —even if we had an army, only a lunatic would think of just charging out there!”

“ _Well!_ ” Eames raised a hand in the air. San Lorenzo fell quiet and turned their heads to him.

That alone should be a testament to how hopeless they felt the entire situation was.

“Well...” he then began once all eyes were on him, “I uh...think we could start by telling Evil Puss to stop treating these earthquakes like a joke. And, you know...get him to work together with us to find a way how to stop these earthquakes from destroying the town. I mean, _he_ lives here _too_. He’s gotta be concerned about his own safety too…right?”

That suggestion was met with immediate disgust.

“Ha!” spat out Señora Zapata, “Because that worked so well _wonderfully_ last time and we should _just_ have an encore, shouldn’t we, _Eames?_ ”

“Yeah, like, bro, _seriously?_ ” The Sphinx rolled her eyes. “I know you _accidentally_ made, like, _one_ suggestion in the past that somehow didn’t semi-mess up, but _talking_ to Evil Puss? That guy isn’t even, like, _right_ in the _head_ , and you just—like—just _want_ to get out there and _talk_ to him?”

For a moment, Eames looked like he was just about to protest and defend himself from the derogatory way he’d just been spoken to. And, really, everyone would never admit it, but they really _did_ hope that, despite all his layers of awkward social inadequacies, Eames’ idea was brilliant enough that it _did_ warrant a protest. But eventually…

He dropped his hand with a dejected sigh and agreed with Sphinx. “Okay, okay. I know. That was a crazy idea.”

“Yes. That laddie won’t ever listen to anything we’d say.” There was a haze of hopelessness over Pajuna’s eyes as she quietly professed her judgment, approaching the bars of her cage and holding on to them. She had seen men like him in the days of her life after all, and they were broken men, perhaps beyond repair—but that should not ever excuse them for their selfishness, cruelty, and ruthlessness. She knew from experience that the only way to take them down...was death. “He’s got other empires to escape to if all hell breaks loose. He doesn’t _care_ about us. He wouldn’t _ever care_ —” she ground her hooves against the bars of her cage, frustrated— “ _even if our world ends!_ ”

“If...our world...ends?”

When everyone swivelled their heads to face the source of the words, they were surprised to find that it was the goblin girl who had spoken.

“Cleevil?” intoned Kid Pickles, suddenly very concerned for the welfare of the one friend he had that he’d since grown to really respect. He began to approach her—they were in the same cage, but with her being in her current state of shock, she didn’t even seem to recognize that everyone was watching her with wary eyes.

“Um…” Kid Pickles shared an anxious glance with everyone else around him, but even they had no idea what he was dealing with. He turned back to Cleevil. “Oi, what’s a haps? Are ya—“

Without heed or warning, Cleevil gasped, as if from the emergent revelation of an epiphanic thought.

 _“Artephius!”_   She scrambled to the bars of her cage so she could scream at the old alchemist who was currently busy picking something in his ear, leaving the startled Kid Pickles very much ignored.

She gripped onto the bars of her cage tightly, her eyes fiercely wild.

“Is it _time?_ ”

Every San Lorenzan held their breath.

_What was she talking about?_

Unfortunately, even their resident mage didn’t seem to comprehend the cryptic nature of the goblin’s question. Or perhaps he did, and was currently just really mentally ill-equipped to handle the gravity of the situation for five seconds. “Ah, yep, you’re right! I think it _is_ time—for _nap_ time! Thanks for reminding me!”

And then he slept, falling as limp as a vegetable right in the Duchess’ arms.

Each San Lorenzan either shook their head or sighed, then returned to their usual places where they sulked the night away, frustrated that, for once, Artephius’ insanity probably made sense.

This really was all they could do.

To wait. To pray.

And hope for a hero to save them.

* * *

“Puss in Boots.”

The spotlight struck his eyes like a bolt of lightning. He staggered. The punch of the force was a physical blow that actually _hurt_ , making his eyeballs feel like exploding and his brain to pound painfully against his skull. Even though he'd shielded his eyes with his paws, the force of the light just seemed to pass them through like they were nothing but the transparent air. It took him a while to adjust to the blinding light, but the moment he did was the moment he became aware of the vast suffocating darkness beyond.

He would have preferred to remain blind.

His ears twitched suddenly, agitated by the sound of boots stomping from behind to approach him. His eyes grew wide and his pupils shrank into predatory pinpricks as each finger on each of his paws curled themselves up to form passive fists.

It was bottled up anger aching to explode.

“Why _hello_ , there,” came the deep, thick, poisonous voice of the evil creature who shared his face and distorted it with his perversity.  

“Did you… _miss_ me?”

He was patient enough to wait. Evil Puss would not have gained an answer either way, though, of course. He was spared not even the tiniest surrender of a glower, a slight turn of the head, or even an intake of breath.

Evil Puss stepped back. He was, honestly, impressed. It seemed as if Puss in Boots was determined not to give him the satisfaction of acknowledging his existence, and so far he was doing well.

He chuckled.

_Two can play at this game._

“I wanted to discuss something with you,” began Evil Puss, his playful words taking their time. He had a crystal glass of red wine in his paw, just the sort that a conceited royal would have, and he leisurely swirled the red liquid around, enjoying the way the light sparkled against it every time the angle perfectly hit them so. “I wouldn't have come down here for no good reason, obviously—I mean, this place is so…ieergh,” he shuddered, then aimlessly gestured at the maddening wall of blackness that surrounded them. “It's a wonder why you're still even standing here in one piece.”

Puss exhaled a breath that he’d most likely been trying to restrain. Evil Puss smirked, smug to see that his words had hit the bull's-eye.

But the smirk immediately died when he decided to set down to business.

“To the point,” he said. “I don't like it when there's something I don't know, because what I don’t know, _I couldn’t control_. So _you_ ,” he said, empathically, “are going to tell _me_ what you _do_ know.” He stepped closer to Puss, now letting the suspicion lace over his words.

“You don’t happen to have received any…warnings from the Tiny Queen before you left the Netherworld, do you?” He asked the question in so flippant a way it almost seemed forced, like even he himself was having trouble maintaining his composure about the gravity of the entire situation.

“Warnings, like, the sort about, well, I don’t know...the end of the world?”

He waited, long and hard. But Puss did not yield. Not even a reaction. Evil Puss leaned back, more than a little bit disgruntled.

He was _not_ used to not being in control.

 _(_ The Scimitar would have rolled his eyes and griped, _Oh, the irony.)_

“I see that you’re not even interested in what I’m about to tell you,” he said, genuinely wanting a conversation now that the growing urgency of the situation called for it. “Listen here. It was months ago when these earthquakes began. Trivial ground shakings at first, and we didn’t really mind. They went in waves—like, for a whole week, they’d go around popping up from the earth in like every single hour, and suddenly, the waves will be gone the next. After two months, they’d appear again, and again, and again, and each time they returned, the intervals in between lessened—and I began to notice a pattern. From bimonthly to monthly, from monthly to biweekly, from biweekly to weekly, and from weekly to days the intervals went. And each time they returned, they grew ever more powerful than the last. It began to concern me when these earthquakes began to ravage your town like a beast, tearing it apart, dwelling by dwelling, crack by agonizing crack.”

Evil Puss had taken on a genuinely concerned note as he continued his narrative. “It’s…come to my attention that something may be abnormally wrong with your world. For the meantime, however, I just assumed that it was just me, what with my whole throwing-the-balance-of-nature-off-its-mighty-pedestal stunt by constantly travelling from between worlds. I control thirteen empires from different universes, after all—I had my work cut out for me. It turns out, however...that that is not the cause. It wasn’t me. It was the world itself.”

His green gaze was purely pensive, deep, anxious—and for once, they held not a shred of malice in them.

“Something was _very_ wrong with this version,” he concluded.

“The Tiny Queen—she had appeared to us through an apparition in the treasure house. Apparently, it seemed like a blind one-way communication and she assumed you’d already returned to San Lorenzo that time, because she came especially to warn _you_. She said about how the Netherworld portal’s instability is causing the gradual collision of the Netherworld to this world, thus the earthquakes. This world and the Netherworld had begun to spin out of control, and every day the spin grows faster and faster, until the day finally arrives that they crash into one another. Since then, we have been informed about how the Tiny Queen had evacuated all the denizens of the Netherworld to somewhere safe—into another dimension, if you will, and she had taken K’fhoggnarh with her…thus the unfortunate reopening of the portal. She warned us to evacuate San Lorenzo—to evacuate this world _permanently_ , because sooner or later, the two worlds will inevitably collide, causing a fiery apocalypse—the end of the everything, if you want to get dramatic.

“But the truth is…” Evil Puss paused for a bit, his eyes glazing over as he thought of his next words. Then he snapped them back up to reality, intent on making it clear to Puss that he did _not_ find any of this earthquake business funny. “I don't really buy any of that stuff. Not yet, at least. I'm _paranoid_ , you see, and I'm very sceptical about this whole end of the world mind game. I wanted to ask—no, _demand_ from you—if you knew something about this whole situation.”

Evil Puss took a delicate sip of his wine before continuing.

“You and the Tiny Queen aren’t...working together to make some sort of prank against me, are you?” His eyes narrowed and the words from his mouth could have practically dripped poisoned honey, sweet though deathly as they were. “I don’t know, maybe you're trying to drive me out of this lousy town by scaring me with classic end-of-the-world news, or maybe it’s your twisted idea of trying to get back at me?”

Puss nearly choked his own tongue in utter disbelief. Here he was, being completely battered by this mental game of words, bombarded by facts he could not even _begin_ to understand anymore, at a shock that San Lorenzo even _had_ an end of the world problem, and Evil Puss was playing the victim and whining about how Puss _might_ have teamed up with the Tiny Queen to set him up on a prank? Felina help him—he had issues alright. This psychopathic man-cat needed to get his priorities straight. And even if there _was_ a threat against San Lorenzo and the world, should Evil Puss _really_ be concerned about being the butt of some childish prank instead of dealing with what actually _needed_ to be dealt with?

Evil Puss leaned back, satisfied.

“No, then? So you're innocent. Good. So now it's just either she’s making this end of the world prank herself, or what she's saying...is actually real.” Evil Puss chewed over the options for a little. It was not long before he decided to punctuate his thoughts with a firm, definitive period by gulping down the rest of his red wine in one sip. “Well then! Whatever the truth is, nothing changes. I have no reason to worry about anything.”

Puss spoke for the first time, effectively surprising Evil Puss.

“I thought you were here to get some answers.” Puss’ green eyes narrowed, and he turned on his heel so he could throw his sharpened gaze towards his enemy. “Yet you proclaim that it would not even matter to you in the end? Why _are_ you here, really?”

Evil Puss was so _delighted_ that he asked.

“To make you feel wretched,” he responded, his giddiness barely even contained.

The passive expression on Puss’ face remained unmoved.

Evil Puss sighed mockingly, as if mourning over his wasted efforts in trying to talk to a rock.

“I wasn’t over with my rambling yet, you know.” Evil Puss swirled his empty glass of wine, and watched in mild indifference as it slowly, magically refilled itself with sparkling claret liquid—Bordeaux wine in its deepest shade of malevolent red. “I never said I came down here to reconcile with you or share information with you or whatever. I came down here on very important business, yes…”

He circled Puss like a predator, and then slowly leaned from behind him, nearing his mouth to Puss’ ear, intent to make him feel the shiver.

“…and that is to _gloat_. To _mock_. To make you feel _wretched_ , because you gotta jump when opportunity calls, am I right?” He let a rough, rumbling sort of laughter caress his words. “I mean, did you _really_ think that once this world ends for real, I would actually go _help_ you evacuate?” He snorted. Unattractively so, Puss thought, but it got the point across—the very idea of helping San Lorenzo disgusted him.

And Puss couldn’t help but be horrified at the fact that these evil, malicious words came from the mouth of _his very mirror image._

“You,” he said, and the words trembled upon his tongue, “are a _monster_.”

“Why, thank you. I aim to please.” The evil smile that spread over the same face he wore intensified Puss’ nausea. “Now, you listen here _carefully_ , Puss in Boots. I don't _care_ about what happens to you, or Dulcinea, or the rest of your petty world. You can burn for all I care.

“But…I imagine. It must be _very_ hard for you to swallow, eh? Because, let's see, let's break this whole thing down into swallowable bits. Assuming what the Tiny Queen said is true, then this world _will_ end the moment it crashes against the Netherworld, effectively killing everyone you hold dear in a brutal and fiery apocalypse. And, what triggered this in the first place? Let me think, let me think… _ah_ , I remember. The _portal_ is the cause for all of this. The unstable portal that no known spell can ever close again.”

Evil Puss tapped his chin in a pretence of deep thought.

“Which, of course…wouldn’t have to be unstable in the first place if it wasn't even opened! But well, what do you know, how _unfortunate_ was it…that you just _had_ to be tricked by a foolish, clopping goat to go squabbling for the deadly power of the Crown of Souls? And even _stupider_ …you actually _used_ it with _your very own paws_ to open the portal and release the Bloodwolf himself! The ultimate act of idiocy, that one! If only you hadn’t met that goat while you were out on the noble quest of trying to restore the spell of San Lorenzo, right? Oh, yes, that’s _right_ , it’s all that _goat’s_ fault, we should blame _Uli!_

“But wait!” He halted himself in his mad rampage. “Something—something seems wrong with that…Uli wouldn’t have even been allowed inside San Lorenzo if it had its protection spell that kept people of evil hearts out of town _in the first place_. And who was it, really…who was it that meddled with other peoples’ business and so greedily destroyed the spell that kept the town safe for hundreds of years? I hope you see where I’m going with this, because personally, I think it’s pretty clear who’s at fault this.” A pause. “Whole.” A second.

“ _Time_.”

Puss turned his head away.

“That’s it? That’s your reaction?” Instead of being disappointed, Evil Puss was actually rather…intrigued by this ‘lack’ of recoil. _Because who knows what’s happening inside, right?_ He chuckled. He could practically hear the fanboy screams of the Scimitar in his ear, gushing about how deliciously evil he was being.

“So…you don’t care? Aren’t you even plagued by a single iota of guilt? Come on, what’s this passivity, it’s not what I came down here for!”

Puss let surface a smirk, though even he seemed to struggle in trying to keep up an arrogant façade. “You are wasting your words on me.”

Evil Puss condescendingly clapped his paws at the sound of him trying to be superior. “Oh, no, wipe that smirk off your face. Drop this nomad-loner-free-spirit act of yours, _will you_. You _feel_ guilty, and I can’t believe this—you’d actually even try to run away from _that feeling of guilt?_ No, no, don’t pretend that my words can’t reach you. I _know_ who you are. I mean…I’m _you!_ The only real difference is that you have less of a spine than I do. Ah, let’s take a moment to revel in this wonderful moment, shall we? That there is something beautifully _poetic_ about all this? Me, stuffing all the sins you’ve done down your throat, so you’d have something to chew on—choke on—while you’re down here in this dark, damp chamber, with nothing but these walls as your dearest friends?”

_Do not react. Remain impassive. No. It would only satisfy him._

“I’ve said this before, and I’ll say this again. San Lorenzo _fell_ because of you,” hissed Evil Puss, an edge now on his deep, rough baritone. “San Lorenzo _suffers_ because of you. I don’t know what kind of delusion you’ve been keeping yourself in this entire time, but San Lorenzo _never_ loved you, and the only reason they even kept you around is that you _owe_ them a debt.”

He closed his eyes.

_Lies._

“You never belonged here,” Evil Puss continued. “You deserve to be cast out.”

_Enough._

_Talking._

“And you should _never_ have even come here in the first place.”

_Enough._

“But alas,” he said, voice falling into a whisper, tinged with so much sorrow that his mockery seemed to border too much on personal truth. “That one crucial mistake can _never_ be undone now.

Evil Puss turned his gaze to the black void above. “Or…” he trailed off suggestively.

Then smirked.

“ _Can_ it?”

Puss turned, now unashamed of the angry tears in his eyes.

Evil Puss stepped back, more than a little astonished.

“Then tell me,” demanded Puss, his voice deceptively soft. “Tell me _how_.”

Evil Puss brought up his paw to examine his claws.

He sneered.

Puss blinked those stubborn tears away and clenched his fists because he has had _enough_ of this.

He charged at him, determined to bring this thing down teeth and claw if he had to.

“Enough taunting me, you _slimy_ — _!_ ”

But Evil Puss _wasn’t_ there, and the moment Puss had passed through his ghost is the moment he found himself barred in a cage instead.

What…

“ _What?_ ”

He looked around.

Where was Evil Puss?

Why was he suddenly alone?

…was that entire conversation even _real?_

_And what in the nine whiskers of Felina is even happening?_

The cage is closing in on him. The bars—the _bars?_ —they are talking. They are… _talking?_ That cannot be right—but where is all this noise coming from? The ringing, in his ears, the ringing, it kept on ringing, and _ringing_ —no, not ringing, they are singing… _chanting_. Puss took a frantic step back, no, _this cannot be right_ , a step back, a step—until his back slammed against the bars from behind him and _he cannot escape from this anymore_

the bars of the cage were closing in on him, closing in, closing in,

chanting, chanting—

dissonant, cacophonic, distressing, clamorous and harsh and loud and _please stop_ he covered his ears with his paws and he _screamed_ —

i’ll do anything, i—please, just

please—

 _all this mess can never be undone_ , _can never be undone, can NEVER be undone,_ and it is _all—_

_because—_

_of **you** —_

_“PLEASE STOP IT!”_

* * *

“Puss?”

A panicked Puss pushed himself up from the desert ground so he could whip his head back and attack the villain who _dared—_

Dulcinea took a frightened step back and put her paws up in surrender at the sword, the trembling tip of which found itself pointed directly over the pounding heart inside her chest.

Puss was breathing deeply, and there was a haze over his eyes that made him look like he was looking at something distant, something inward—something _frightening_ , and he did not see her, not _really_ , because he was _not here_.

Not mentally.

Dulcinea let a paw rest over the blade of his sword and gently, gently pushed it down, then pried it off his paw to safely rest it far away from his reach as she knelt before him. His gaze was still thunderstruck, and for some reason, he was still…panting.

As if he’d been running from something.

“Puss?”

All she could do was wonder what Evil Puss had done to her friend and she thought of all the different ways on how she could deform that slimy villain’s face with her bare fists. What might have happened in _that dark alley_ when they had fought each other one-on-one was beyond her, and though she was desperate to know, she feared it would not be something she’d ever be able to take. _Puss_ …Dulcinea suspected that something had been done to him. He’d been acting strangely lately. Ever since she’d found him in that cage, he’d been rambling about talking to walls and bars and inescapable logics. He’s restless, irritable, vulnerable.

He is not himself.

Puss had his certain quirks whenever he was faced with stress, such as sudden impulses to build moats or futilely punch the ground—it was aggression that he turned to whenever his blood brimmed with the tension of impending doom.

But talking to walls, nightmares, mood swings, sudden spells of shock such as this one?

He turned to _aggression_ to release his stress, _not_ this sustained mental anguish.

And even if he’d exhibited this before, his mental lashes…they were never this far-reaching.

_“Puss.”_

And just when she thought they were making progress. They were back to square one, and all that hard work they’d made trying to climb out of this hole was effort chucked into the vacuum of a wastebasket. She can’t help but curse _that_ earthquake to the deepest, darkest, most unforgiving depths of the Netherworld, and she didn’t care if her thoughts were very progressively starting to not sound very nice anymore.

“ _PUSS!_ ”

He snapped his eyes back to hers, suddenly yanked away from whatever memory had been brewing inside his head.

Dulcinea’s blue eyes were bright with worry and wide with patient anticipation as she waited for him to come around, willing him to _calm down. Calm down, Puss—_

_Calm down._

The quickened pace of Puss’ panicked heart slowed down, slowed down, and once he realized he was not _back there_ anymore—

He closed his eyes. Turned his head to the star-filled heavens. He let loose the tension from his shoulders, and the relief could not have been a more palpable sensation in the desert’s cold night air.

“ _Felina_ ,” he swore.

How his paws trembled as he grasped the soft sands of the ground did not escape Dulcinea’s ever perceptive eyes.

“ _Puss_ ,” Dulcinea demanded, the typical reaction of any worried woman trying to mask her distress and desperation with anger—anger, first and foremost, for hearing him utter the name of his matron saint in vain, and second of all to shake him from his increasingly strange series of actions that were starting to worry her out of her mind. She longed to reach out to him, but she kept her hands closed into fists at her sides for fear of another...

She banished that thought immediately and decided to dare ask nonetheless.

“What,” she began, softly, with all the danger of a woman, “was _that_ all about.”

And though her voice was but a whisper, the words that contained her demand held more power than she could’ve ever thought herself capable. Because that question, it was not a gentle request. It was a demand—a plea, calling out to him and letting him know that she was here, that she was his best friend, that he _could confide in her_. If only he would _stop_ this ridiculous notion that he had to _protect her from himself_ by keeping her out, because how was _she_ supposed to protect _him_ if he did everything in his power to push her away? If only Puss could see that even the protector needed protecting, if only he could see that she was more than willing to pour her heart and soul just to _fit_ that role, if only he would stop being so blinded by his own complicated meshwork of superiority and inferiority...

If only he began seeing that he, too, _needed_ other people...

Then _maybe_.

Maybe he could begin his path to healing whatever wounds he kept carrying to this day. Dulcinea knew nothing of his past, because he tended to veer the topic away from it whenever it even came even just within the sixty-mile-radius of the comfortable zone of their conversation, but even _she_ could see that Puss in Boots had a lot of unresolved issues. She was only often left wondering what kind of life he’d led before they met, what shaped him to be like this, who he really _is_.

She’d long wondered why he’d been travelling in the middle of the Western Desert when she first met him on that fateful day in the Thieves’ Market.

( _I am a nomad._ )

She’d long wondered if he’d always been so…alone.

( _a free spirit._ )

Wondered why he’d been so reluctant to admit his attachment to San Lorenzo, even if it was so painfully obvious—as if a declaration of his love and devotion equated to what Dulcinea knew he _really_ feared…abandonment, and betrayal.

( _and I need no one._ )

She’d wondered if he had friends and families that kept him awake at night, and wondered why he never seemed to bring them up—as if he feared that the nightmares of the past would come back to haunt him if he ever brought them back to the surfaces of his memory. Those very memories threatened the fragile illusion of bravery and honour that he’d cast all over himself, the illusion so thickened by ego and pretence if only to shield the vulnerable heart he’d never admit he had.

But that same illusion was cracking as failure after failure of protecting San Lorenzo came crashing down on his shoulders. She could see him desperately scrambling to put the heroic mask back because he didn’t want _her_ of all people to see how broken he really is. It was as if he didn’t seem to trust her enough to hold his vulnerable heart, afraid that she was going to break it, and it broke her own core that despite all her efforts, he was pushing her away, as if fearing that if he’d ever allowed her in, he wouldn’t be able to protect her from him, and his own self from her.

 _‘What,’ she had demanded, ‘was_ that _all about?’_

Puss eventually then stood up, dusting the sand off his fur. He turned his gaze towards far away, but this time he did so intentionally so he could avoid her inquiring eyes.

Dulcinea had to wait long, ticking seconds for the answer.

But she handled it like she’d always handled Puss before.

_With patience._

“It was an earthquake,” he answered, simply.

Dulcinea clenched her jaw.

She took a step back.

Back to square one indeed.

Dulcinea sighed, and went back to sit on their little log to warm her paws by the fire. She had no intention of giving up on Puss, not ever, but for now...she was emotionally tired. From everything that had occurred since the day they’d returned from the Netherworld, she’d never really had a chance to rest her mind—even in sleep, all she’d ever done was _but_ rest. And Puss’ complicated issues were only exacerbating her exhaustion.

“Oh. Okay.” She cleared her throat. Her soft voice was just as quiet as before, but now, it lacked its former formidable strength. “Was…this what Evil Puss was talking about, though? Back then, when we first came into the treasure house? These…earthquakes?”

Instead of calming the conversation down, which was her initial intention when she’d first asked her questions, the tension heightened, and she thought that she finally figured it out.

The word _earthquakes_ seemed to be the trigger.

He took a sharp inhale of breath, and for several moments, Dulcinea received no answer again.

Until all of a sudden…

“‘ _When a mess you have made at night_ ,” he blurted from seemingly out of the blue, his back still turned to her but his paws clenched into fists at his side, “‘ _it is your job to set it right_.’”

She blinked.

Did he just...quote something to her from the Wee Compendium of Factes and Funne?

“Huh?” Suddenly, she lost track of herself. What did that quote have to do with anything about the earthquakes?

 _Well_ , she thought. _This was worrisome._

“But...but that was about wetting a bed...”

“Well,” said Puss, his tone suspiciously sage and casual, “as a wise lady once said to me, the rhyme obviously wanted to say that when one has caused a problem, one would have to solve it.” He determinedly put his fists on his waist, but Dulcinea knew her friend’s mercurial moods were but a manifestation of his own self-hatred, self-denial, self-condemnation.

“And I intend to do just that!” he ended with a proud and significant punctuation.

“Um...” Dulcinea gulped. Puss was on to something, and she was almost so afraid to ask what it really is that he _intended_ to do. “Let’s go over this slowly for me, Puss. You...intend to fix this...how?”

“By undoing it all,” he answered without skipping a beat. His voice dripped of wonder and marvel over the very idea of ‘undoing’ itself ( _can never never **never** be undone and it is all because of **you—**_ ) He spread his arms out wide at her, ever the theatrical showman. “The solution—it is so breath-taking in its simplicity. We are going to fix this, by _literally_ undoing it all!”

Dulcinea never liked it when he had that crazy look in his eyes.

“I...don’t understand what you mean, Puss.”

“Obviously,” he said, “I meant _undoing_ all this. _Literally_ undoing all this.” He snapped his fingers in the air, as if nothing should’ve been more obvious than this.

“By turning. Back. _Time!”_

It took her several moments of blankness before the weight of what he was trying to say truly sank in.

Turning back time.

Turning back... _what?_

“ _Puss?_ ”

She’d lost track of him. Despair dawned on her horizon as she came to realize that she’d _lost_ track of her very best friend and that she didn’t know who this madman _was_ anymore.

“Maybe there is a way,” he told her, that sudden enthusiasm sparking something in his eyes that Dulcinea couldn’t identify. “Maybe there _is_ a way to go back in time. The rule of Evil Puss, the opening of the portal, the summoning of the Bloodwolf—“ he enumerated every sin each with a unique lash of guilt and self-hatred, but this last one was the bitterest of all—as if he considered his very presence in San Lorenzo a crime—“ _and_ the destruction of San Lorenzo’s protective spell. With all that has happened,” he rambled on, “is it not imperative to turn back time, so that it would be as if _none_ of those terrible things had _ever_ even happened? This is the solution, Dulcinea, and tell me I am right. _Tell_ me, Dulcinea!”

“That’s…” She would have burst out laughing, but the grave seriousness in his voice put a stopper in her throat and the laugh came out as somewhat like a half-choke instead. _As if none of those terrible things ever happened_. _Terrible_ things, he said—but what about the happier things? It was as if he _wanted_ to throw all his memory of San Lorenzo away, solve his problems the only way he knew how—by running away from them all.

Dulcinea didn’t even bother with going gentle this time. Speaking the truth and nothing else, she argued, vehemently, “I can’t even find a word to describe how _terrible_ that plan is, Puss!”

“Terrible? But it is perfect!”

“Well, then, for _starters_ ,” she challenged, “How are we even _supposed_ to turn back time?”

She expected him to go silent, so she was more than baffled to find that he was actually ready with an answer.

“When Evil Puss disappeared under the foot of K’foggnargh,” he began with manic excitement, “he claimed to have landed onto the _future_ timeline of his original universe, where he was immediately despised by his own homeworld. We know that he had used Artephius’ mercuric chalk to accomplish this. Evil Puss travelled ten years into the _future_ of _his_ timeline, Dulcinea, and since we saw him leave the original chalk behind, he must’ve used another chalk to bring himself back to _our_ time to execute his petty revenge.” Somewhere during his explanation he’d begun to pace across the sand, the plan from his mind running to his tongue like liquid water. “If such a magical chalk could manipulate temporal dimensions, there stands the possibility that Artephius could produce a _similar_ mercuric chalk…but it functions in _reverse_ to the original one he had created.” He looked at Dulcinea, willed her to understand. “It will send me _back_ in time, instead of the future—and it would even require a simpler spell, because the only timeline that I would intend to alter is _this_ one!” He threw his arms apart to gesture at _all_ this—this mess. “I shall travel so far back in time, so I would never have had to go to San Lorenzo, thereby never triggering the series of events that led to this disaster in the first place!”

She continued to listen in dread and disbelief as Puss went on with his tirade.

“Everyone would have no memory of me otherwise,” he said, the words so easily rolling off his tongue like they meant nothing to him and it hurt, _it_ _hurt Dulcinea’s heart like fire_ , “which would probably be for the best since I, Puss in Boots, had brought nothing but suffering to San Lorenzo. A brilliant idea, yes. I shall go ask Artephius. Maybe there is such a possibility!”

Dulcinea shot back up to her feet quicker than she thought herself capable and caught him by his shoulder, before he ran off like he always did when he proclaimed he had a brilliant idea. The only difference now was that the idea was _downright terrible_.

“Okay _look_.” She was not even bothering to hide the exasperation anymore, because suddenly her blood was fuelled by fear. Fear that what Puss was saying was actually _possible_ , and that he’d actually go _through with_ _it_ , and he’d so stupidly go back in time thinking it was best if he left San Lorenzo alone, if he left _her_ alone... “Even if _that_ was possible,” Dulcinea argued, “you’re not only talking about undoing the bad things, Puss!”

_You’re also talking about undoing **everything**. _

_Every adventure, every memory, every good deed you’ve ever done, everything I’ve helped you learn, everything you’ve ever shown me._

_You’re talking about undoing yourself._

A lump grew in her throat and tears threatened her eyes.

_About undoing **us**. _

“What? I…" Her words seemed to make him stop for a moment to consider what he had just said, but he was quick to shake them off with a shake of his head. "Do not take this the wrong way, Dulcinea, _please_ , I do not want you to think that I never…valued my memories of San Lorenzo. Of everyone who lived in it. Of…”

_Of you._

“If that’s true,” she retorted, “then why? Why would you even _think_ like this?” Her voice broke. “Am I—r-really just— _just to be done away with?_ ”

“I—I am a danger to you, Dulcinea, to all of San Lorenzo!” He wrenched his shoulder away from her hold, backed away from her like he was suddenly on fire and he didn’t want her to get hurt, to get burned from the danger, the monster, that was his very self. “And—and as its protector, I am obliged to remove any and all who threaten it. Even if the threat has to be myself. I thought you said you understand this!”

“What I don’t understand,” she parried right back, “is why you think you’re the only one who has to do all the work here. No, _zip it_ , I know what you’re going to say. Because you need no one? No, you are _not_ going back to anywhere, Puss. You will stay here—” She stepped closer, approached him like the mortally wounded kitten that he had suddenly shrunk into, “stay here, with me…and help me figure this out.”

He backed away again. “But I already _have_ figured it out! Let me fix the problem I have created long months ago, and cut this farce from the very root! _Behold—_ ”

“There could be literally a hundred ways to solve this if we just thought hard enough—”

“ _—my ineludible logic!_ ”

She sighed. They were running around in circles and _they were getting nowhere._

“It’s just…Evil Puss, you know?” she began again. “Okay, Evil Puss and an entire wolf army, but we’ve met other villains like him and we’ve defeated them all. You’ve faced the _Bloodwolf_ himself, and Evil Puss is nowhere near as threatening as him. We don’t—we don’t _need_ to do something as drastic as turning back time. Why…why are you _so scared of him_ , Puss? _Please_ ,” she begged, “please, _tell_ me. Did he—did he ever do something to you that I don’t know? I _know_ there is something you aren’t telling me. I want to help you.”

He took a breath.

“Do you want everything to return the way it had once been, Dulcinea?”

A loaded question.

Dulcinea bit back the tears.

He was purposefully evading her.

He was _actively trying to deceive her._

…this is not the Puss in Boots she knew.

_Do you want everything to return the way it had once been…Dulcinea?_

“Please tell me you don’t mean to trick me with a question like that, Puss.”

The faint traces of a smile graced his handsome features, but it wasn’t the sort of smile she wanted to see.

“I fear that you have always been too sharp for me, Dulcinea,” he finally conceded with a chuckle. “But believe me, _por favor_ …there is no other way. The portal cannot be closed again, according to Artephius. And if the portal cannot be closed, the destruction of the world cannot be stopped.”

Dulcinea suddenly turned to him. “Wait, _destruction_ of the world?”

Puss cringed as if berating himself for the slip of the tongue. “The earthquakes.”

“I’m going to need more than that.”

“The earthquakes ravaging San Lorenzo,” he elaborated. “They are because—they are because this world is on its course of collision against the Netherworld, the heart of which is the instability of the Netherworldian portal that I have opened in the first place.”

“You did not open that portal, Puss. Uli did.” And she will keep pounding that into his head until he got it. “But...” But that wasn’t what mattered at the moment.

“But how did you _know_ all that?”

Puss turned away. “I…”

_(I have been having dreams. Dreams that felt too real, he wanted to say, dreams that made too much sense. But he cannot, he cannot tell her, he did not want to share his horrors to Dulcinea, and this was his fault to bear alone in the first place.)_

Dulcinea shook it off, deciding that she’d seen worse and they will deal with this like they always have—together. “Okay, if you don’t want to tell me, it doesn’t matter. If this whole thing is way worse than we thought, then we—we—” Should gather an army? Should they go search for the moles and the megamicres, just as she had thought earlier?

She shocked even herself when the words finally blurted out of her mouth.

“Then we’ll seek out Sino.”

It was his _flabber_ ’s turn to be _gasted_.

_“What?”_

(It seems they were on a competition of whose idea was crazier.)

Under normal circumstances, the idea of seeking out an age-old mage sounded crazy, but now that she’d blurted it out in the open battlefield, even _that_ didn’t seem so crazy anymore. Maybe it was a sign that she was getting desperate, and the fact that she didn’t care that she sounded desperate was proof that she was desperate enough to compete against Puss’ time-travelling idea with her searching-for-a-mage-that-may-actually-be-long-dead idea.

And Puss looked really very _really_ torn about that idea. “But Dulcinea, we do not even—“

“No…” And as the final piece slowly seemed to click on her mind, a surge of inspiration flowed through her when she realized that this, this plan— _it made a semblance of sense after all_. “That’s it!” Suddenly, Dulcinea was so excited by the idea that she grabbed Puss by both his shoulders and looked him into the eye telling him, telling him _they had the chance to win this after all._

“Puss. When we were fighting the Bloodwolf, and I was in the Realm of Shades, there was—there was that tulpa, Orange. She said, she...she said that Sino created _three_ tulpas. _Three_. That means there are still two around! Maybe, _maybe_ if we could find _one_ of them,” she stepped back, snapped a finger into the air, “ _they’ll_ know where Sino is!”

Dulcinea’s plan was far more simplistic than Puss’ time travel one—well, yes, it involved searching out a mage that should’ve died centuries ago, but her plan somehow made more _sense_ , and it is this sense that finally, _finally_ snapped Puss out of his mad delusions.

For he looked like he’d just been slapped onto the face by Dulcinea a second time.

“You are…you are right, Dulcinea. Of course…of course!” And for a moment as Dulcinea observed him, Puss seemed...like himself again. His dead green eyes lit to life, and the smile on his face was so beautiful that she wondered why it seemed _centuries_ ago since she’d last seen it. She thought she should be glad that he’s back, he’s back—but then she suddenly caught herself.

_Wait…this is strange._

_And this Puss seemed like...he just snapped out of a trance. Snapped out of a dream._

(Snapped out of someone else’s control.)

Suddenly, as Dulcinea stood there with growing worry, watching Puss ramble on about how stupid he’d been to even consider time travel as a plan—

Puss stopped talking.

He paused from his pacing.

He looked down at his paws, paws that he then brought up over his forehead as if to relieve it from some sort of pain.

“Dulcinea? My…my head…I feel dizzy. I…I think…” He blinked as if to clear the fog from his eyes, and he lifted his eyes from the ground so he could look at her with a newfound clarity he never knew he lacked. “Someone...it was not me. The idea of travelling back into time...I do not know why it made sense. _No_. Someone—has planted that idea...and invaded my—”

To Dulcinea’s horror, Puss did not finish his sentence, for his legs suddenly crumbled beneath him and he collapsed to the ground.

As limply as a ragdoll.

She can’t continue living like this forever.

_“Puss!”_

* * *

Somewhere, not really very far away from the vast expanse of the Western Desert, a contemptuous chuckle filled the eerie silence of a dark room. _Oh, Dulcinea, Dulcinea…the One from the Ancient Prophecy whose purity of heart could cleanse even that of others._

Well.

He shall have that fixed in a minute.

He brought his lips to whisper to his doll—a needle was sticking out of its chest. He refilled its head with the darkness and desperation and despair he’d previously filled it with, dirtying it once again with blackness and chasing away Dulcinea’s cleansing words of _‘We’ll just seek out Sino!’_ nonsense. Bah.

“ _You_ ,” drawled Evil Puss, “are _not_ involving any Great Mages into this, Puss in Boots. This is between you and me. You’ll follow my orders…and my orders only.”

_Turning back time is the ONLY way for you to save your friends._

_So come here to San Lorenzo so you could accomplish THAT ridiculous time travel plan I made up just for you._

_Come here so I can execute MY plan of revenge._

_Fall right into my trap…_

_Kitty kitty._

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So. 
> 
> We're finally getting somewhere!
> 
> You guys may have noticed that I changed the title of this story, and shall now be henceforth known as For San Lorenzo. I think it's a more appropriate title than the previous one. 
> 
> And, ha ha...nothing can excuse my prolonged absence. But I am sorry. Writing this particular chapter was a long and hard battle. I decided to edit this huge thing last night, and I became so immersed in the manuscript that when I finally snapped out of the writing spell I was shocked to find out that it was already 5: 30 am. Yes, I am a sleep-deprived student recently bombed with the stress of school workload and college preparation stuff, but I'd happily deprive myself of sleep...when it's for San Lorenzo. :3 I don't think this chapter came out the way I wanted it to, but I have been rewriting this one for a million times and I think I really need to move on. 
> 
> Now, I wanted to take this space to tell you that I hope it'd been made clear that Evil Puss is using the dolls to psychologically manipulate both Puss and Dulcinea's dreams and decisions and delusions. At first, he'd been doing that just to mess with their heads, but since the two of them escaped, he found that he could actually mentally manipulate them into coming back to San Lorenzo again (aka lying to Puss that he needs Artephius' mercuric chalk so he could turn back time) so he could finally exact his revenge on Puss. 
> 
> If you're still confused about the plot, well...I've done my best. 
> 
> There may be some questions, like the question of how Evil Puss is able to manipulate minds using the dark arts in the first place. All will be revealed in due time...I just hope you stay tuned! Really, I am so, so fortunate that I even have you guys as my readers in a fandom that seems so barren and empty, and I could only feel guilty for saying that weekly updates are no longer possible from now on...obviously...because embarrassingly, I've run out of chapters to post. Fear not, though! No matter how long it seems to take me, never think I've abandoned this story for good. It's grown too close to my heart for me to even dare. 
> 
> Just- thank you, everyone. For your continued support. It really is very much appreciated. 
> 
> Until next time!


	11. Pride Over Matter

Puss fell.

He could not fathom where he had fallen from. As he fell through the space of the bottomless black, all he could make out of infinity’s starless veil was the lone island of San Lorenzo, a humble, provincial town engulfed in a magical protective bubble that thrummed with the life of lazuline power.

But he was falling far beneath it, and as he did, the bubble of San Lorenzo grew ever more distant, more and more until it was but a star, a star that glowed a cool blue hue, the lone star in this—in _his_ —vastly empty universe. A star was a star, however, and in a universe like this, he really was left with nothing to do but _stare at it_ , because if he knew, that if let his eyes wander away for even just a second, he would immediately be met by nothing but the crippling blackness of space.

So he stared at the star, the star that was so far out of reach—staring at it with eyes deprived of light for so long that light itself nigh blurred into but a concept. He stared at the star the way an old man would keep grasping at whatever straws of time left that life may yet grant him.

But further still, further he fell. Fell, until that star shrank again, tinier and tinier until he had to strain his eyes to even focus on seeing it—a speck of dust. A speck which then soon got whisked away into the darkness by non-existent winds, fading out and blending into the Nothing, like it had never been there in the first place.

And now, without the star that had kept the last vestiges of his sanity anchored onto the realm of reality, without the town he considered home, without the last thing he ever considered his everything—without San Lorenzo, far and forever out of reach from his desperate paws, he was left in the complete black silence of nothing, and he no longer fell.

He no longer fell, because as time passed, he realized nothing ever happened in this realm…that there was no force that desired to pluck him out of this miserable void. That constant fear brought about by falling, that fear of hitting the ground, had dissipated into numbness.

He no longer fell, just idly drifted along.

Like a barren moon, a dead star, or an abandoned homeworld in a forgotten corner of the universe, lost without an orbit to follow—he was but an empty, hollow shell of who once was Puss in Boots.

That is, until, a voice reached out to him and snapped him out of his mindless reverie.

_“Puss of the Boots.”_

Had he known he was not the butt of this joke, he would have burst into laughter at that.

And _just_ when he had started to enjoy the solitude and abandonment he thought—no, he _definitely_ deserved. This was supposed to be his punishment, and he _meant_ to serve it, wholly, fully, willingly, with all the dignity of a man who honoured his values. Paying his debts is a task marked with a significantly high priority in his code of honour.

So he loathed it whenever _something_ kept him from trying to do just that.

“I have kept reminding you countless of times,” echoed a woman’s deep warrior voice, an all-too-familiar one that had become a constant nuisance inside his brain ever since his return from the Netherworld.

“You are the Chosen One from the Great Prophecy.”

_Not THIS again._

He felt his entire body grow tense and he bit the words out through clenched teeth—

“I am _not The One_.”

Immediate regret shot up his spine at the utterance of those bitter words though, because suddenly, he felt his body being pulled downward, downward—and what was once weightless was falling through the space again, and sooner than the scream had been ripped out of his throat that he landed a heap of heaving orange fur onto cool, solid rock.

For a moment, he wondered why he was not somehow dead yet from that sort of impact. But as he pushed himself up from the floor, he realized that nothing in his body was in pain. He took a moment to catch his breath. As soon as his brain had rebooted and was able to function once more, he let his eyes wander, taking in the familiar surroundings and absorbing the cool, steel blue light that washed the inside of what he now realized was a cave—a cave of flat-surfaced stones cut sharply at the edges, making for a jagged interior design that was nonetheless unostentatious. He recognized this place.

He had been here before.

“We believe,” declared the woman behind him, pulling him away from his reminiscence and dragging him back down into the grave reality, “that you _are_ the One from the Great Prophecy.”

Those words weighed so heavily upon his shoulders that it manifested itself into the physical pain of his stomach twisting in on itself. He let his lids press over his eyes as he tremblingly drew in a breath to brace himself.

Then, he willed his feet to lift his boots from the floor so he could turn his body around.

He released the breath he’d been holding. Opened his eyes. Lifted them up, slowly, anxiously, until they rested upon her own single one that she fixed firmly on his own. Her single eye, her muscled tones, her unique, beautiful purple skin—with the proud way she held herself, it was not a mistake to assume that she was the leader of the Netherworld’s Zephilim warriors. Assuredly enough, she was not a sight, nor a voice, nor a name to forget, especially if she’d been haunting your dreams insisting you are a part of some grand scheme of fate without really telling you _why_.

He asked the question nonetheless, his voice bordering on desperateness.

“But _why?_ ”

 _Why me? Why this? You keep saying there is a grand scheme. There must then be a grand, all-powerful master schemer orchestrating these events! So where_ is _he—or she? Why does whoever he is have to burden_ me _, when I am just—_

He was so overwhelmed that he felt like choking.

_Just a powerless mortal?_

“The world is _disintegrating_ , Zuva,” stressed the ginger gato, his fur markedly rising and sticking out so he looked like a madman on the edge. “ _We have no time for this_. If someone out there really has enough power to give me _this_ fate you are speaking of, then why does he not—come here for _himself?_ ”

Zuva's sigh bled of so, so much weariness.

“Don’t you remember,” she emphatically said, “passing the tests of the Zoon Zaree?”

And…that was the last straw.

“What th—the _Zoon Zaree—_ are you _joking_ with this? Even _I_ am not that—that—!” Unable to squeeze the appropriate word out of his brain, he groaned and ran a paw down his face while throwing his other arm up in the air, stomping around in a circle before spinning back to face her. The exasperation on Puss’ face had contorted into anger—a chaotic conglomeration of confusion, exhaustion, and frustration. _The Zoon Zaree_ — _what a joke._ “You must think me an _idiota_ , Zuva,” he finally ground out, barely able to keep his voice level. “The Zoon Zaree is nothing but a series of nonsense, and the only reason I have even participated in that pile of garbage is to please the señoritas. No! I refuse to believe all of this!”

Zuva’s expression remained stoic. “Then don't believe. What are you planning to do? _Turn back time?_ ”

“I—” He stopped. His voice was a ragged whisper. “Is there anything _else_ I can do?”

“Take all your belongings with you,” she said, so casually as if it was the most obvious thing in the world, even shrugging her shoulders for good measure. “Take your steed, your woman—“

The frown on his face morphed into a scowl and he stepped forward to point a stern finger at her. “Her name is Dulcinea, Zuva.”

“—to far, far away, away from the danger posed by the Blind King who reigns over your town,” she finished, not at all seeming bothered by his little interruption. The glare in her eye sharpened as if to underline the significance of her next words.

“Together, you must seek the Great Mage.”

_Sino._

Something clawed its way into his heart.

He stepped closer to her, closer as his voice was to cracking around the edges.

_Helplessness._

That line of reasoning _seemed_ reasonable since they had nothing else—no powerful artefact, no magical spell, no band of heroes, _nothing_ to rely on to save their town as they have in the past. No, the time has finally come for them to seek out the Great Mage himself, who through the power of his hands had created San Lorenzo in the first place.

Help…that word _stung_ his pride still. Well, yes, Dulcinea had once made it clear to him that needing _help_ was not so bad, but how could he stop himself from feeling this way? He was the one who destroyed San Lorenzo’s protection spell—therefore he must stand as its protector in the spell’s absence. And he must uphold it, on his own, for the fault was only his to bear. So _needing help?_ How pathetic could he get? It was proof of his weakness. Of his inadequacy. Needing _help_ was proof of how such a failure he was in fulfilling the role he’s committed himself to since the very first day—to protect San Lorenzo, upon his sword and in his honour.

It made sense to look far and wide to ask for the… _help_ …of this powerful mage, _if_ he was going to value San Lorenzo over his pride (and, truly, he _did_ , but only by a close, _close_ second.)

But even if that _was_ the solution, it was not without a huge, gaping problem.

“But Zuva,” shrilled Puss, “Sino must be _centuries old_. How do we know that he is even alive? Where would we even begin looking for him?”

Zuva then did the most atrocious thing he had ever seen someone do in a crisis like this.

She _smiled_.

_And how_ **dare** _she?_

“This is just the beginning, Puss of the Boots. Your world and ours are on its way to a collision, and the Tiny Queen has evacuated all the denizens of the Netherworld, including us the Zephilims, onto a safer realm—a realm that the Great Mage himself had prepared for us. Sino,” she continued sagely, “is the one who had written the _Ancient_ Prophecy and embedded it into our literature, which foretells how the Chosen One will pass the Zoon Zaree…which Sino himself, again, had designed. For centuries, we the Zephilims have continuously been seeking the hero who shall lead our army against an omen…until _you_ finally came into our realm in our time of strife. And our conjecture had been proven right when you overthrew the Blind King. It is literally just how our scriptures had foretold.” Her look hardened upon him. “Foresight of that magnitude is not to be doubted, Puss of the Boots.”

Puss stayed silent as he let Zuva’s words sink in.

“…that literally did not answer my question at all.”

Zuva scoffed, her metal armour rattling as she crossed her muscular arms over her chest. “You can find the Great Mage in the Forbidden Citadel, obviously.”

Puss’ whiskers stuck straight out at the anticipation of danger. _Forbidden?_

“Then where can I find this Citadel?”

“I’m sorry,” she said, putting her palms up. “I can only give the name of the structure. I have never been aboveground, so I know not where it is. Perhaps you can ask your resident magicians—as I have been informed by the Tiny Queen, every magic user _should_ know the dwelling of the greatest mage of all.”

“Artephius,” was the first name of a mage that came into Puss’ mind, and he inwardly palmed his face at the implications of that.

_I would have to return to San Lorenzo and grab Artephius first before we can get to the Forbidden Citadel._

Caramba.

“But you,” she continued. “You _are_ the Chosen One that our Ancient Prophecy has foretold. You are _different_ from the One of the _Great_ Prophecy, who has already fulfilled her role when she entrapped the Bloodwolf in the Realm of Shades. _Your_ role is yet to come…but it comes fast. The Great Mage will reveal himself to you when the time is right. He might send a messenger, he might have already laid down the path for you to figure out, or he might show himself to you in visions to give you the instructions he will deem right.” Her eyes widened as soon as the word _visions_ slipped out of her tongue. “Of the visions, however…you must beware. At a time like this…the Tiny Queen senses that mind sorcerers are about. You have been having them, yes?”

“What are you…saying? Visions?”

_You mean nightmares?_

Puss made a step forward to touch her, to _confirm_ this, but at that very moment—

He drew his paw back.

“Then how do I know I should trust _you?”_

“Obviously,” she said simply, “you should not.”

_…well._

Then this makes everything complicated.

“You,” continued Zuva as she knelt before him, and strangely he heard her voice getting farther and farther away as more noise consumed his ears—and why was the world suddenly getting _hotter?_ “You should only learn to trust what _this_ feels.”

He only vaguely felt a finger point at the centre of his chest. He looked up to see Zuva, but her face was getting blurry—and light, light was coming everywhere, flames were roaring in the background, and it was getting _hotter_ —

“For what the mind forgets,” she calmly continues, “the heart…always remembers.”

Flames. Roaring. The stone walls dissolving—

“Zuva,” he rasped out, urgently clutching Zuva’s purple hand with both his paws. “Enough of these riddles, _what is happening?!_ ”

“The reason why I am able to communicate to you right now is because of the power of the Tiny Queen. She wanted me to deliver the message to you that you should find the Great Mage. No matter what.”

_“Why is this happening?!”_

“Someone else is trying to invade your dreams,” said Zuva, and Puss watches in fright as she begins to _fade_ , right before his eyes. “Someone else, who, like me, wants to deliver a message to you. I am fading, but only because the Tiny Queen is currently drawing her powers away to let the _other_ talk to you. But don’t worry. Do not listen to whatever he says. Listen to what you _feel_ is right. I now have little fear that you will choose wrongly, because as of now, you have been fairly warned.”

“But, Zuva—”

_Can you…can you not…_

The words were stuck in his mouth.

Because he _tried_ , time and again, to save San Lorenzo from destruction.

And every time, he failed.

After every failure, he’d _try_ to stand up again, but it had become harder and harder to do so after each and every defeat.

Every time he knew he had succeeded, something will always come from behind him and yank whatever security blanket he had managed to wrap around himself away from him.

Whatever daunting task lied ahead of him now, he had a feeling…he cannot surpass it.

He did not think victory is possible.

He did not know…

_I cannot._

“The Tiny Queen deeply regrets that she cannot shoulder the citizens of your world, Puss of the Boots. She simply does not have the kind of power to save two worlds at once. But,” and in here Zuva smiles, though Puss had to strain his eyes to see it because she was growing ever more transparent by the second, “but…she has trust that _you_ do. You must learn to believe in yourself that you _can_ face this.”

“No,” he uttered coarsely, “Zuva, do _not_ leave—not _yet_ —“

The flames roared.

“No matter what you do, do not run away.”

He fell forward, trying, _trying_ to get a hold of her—

_“—Wait!”_

She had already disappeared.

_ZUVA!_

Puss’ paws landed onto the floor, his knees shaking upon impact onto the hard stone—and he was _heaving_ , his yellow-green eyes wide and open, his mind in a panicked frenzy.

“Well, well, _well_.”

Puss froze at the sound. He looked forward, and he _thought_ he saw a pair of dusty Corinthian leather boots.

His twistedly wretched, degenerate evil twin.

Puss shut his eyes. This was getting annoying. Why can everything not just be solved by the strike of the sword? These mind games were driving him up the wall, and any time soon he was sure to fall into insanity!

“Aren’t you going to face me,” the voice continued, “Puss in Boots?”

Puss said nothing, kept his eyes shut—

“Do not fear. Open your eyes again.”

His clenched paws trembled upon the ground.

But after a moment…he obeyed.

And when he did, he was surprised by what he saw.

The flames that had engulfed the whole place a while ago have already vanished, as if from a single snap of command from a magician’s fingers—gone, just like that, replaced only by a cold, black wall of void, of the immanent Nothing. Or, perhaps, it was the flames that had burned up the cold blue stone, dissolving everything that ever existed in this place, this mindscape, this whatever it is, into the Nothing. But how can he be certain? That was not what truly mattered at the moment.

There was someone else that had taken Zuva’s place.

The man who was suddenly before him stood as regally and magnificently as his statue back in the Treasure House did. He was draped in sky blue robes adorned with gems of the mystical kind. He held a golden sceptre as tall as he was, symbolizing an authority that Puss can only describe as imperial.

_“…Sino?”_

He was suddenly struck by confusion. What did he see earlier, then? Who was this? _How—_

“On your feet, young cat,” said the Great Mage, wasting no more time, “there is still much to do.”

“Zuva,” Puss said, quickly getting up on his feet to obey the order, “she…she had just told me that I shall search for you in the Forbidden Citadel. Do you think I—”

“There is no need to search for me anymore,” snapped Sino. “I _am_ here, am I not? Or do you dare doubt me?”

Immediately, Zuva’s warning about trusting visions was thrown out of the window because right now, he was too desperate to not believe that this was indeed the Great Mage who knew _just_ how to save San Lorenzo.

Effortlessly. _Easily_.

(It did not occur to Puss that _taking the easy route_ might as well have meant the same as _running away_.)

“…no, Sino,” said Puss, reverently removing his hat from his head before he bowed before him. “I do not doubt your words.”

_Or at least…I do not want to._

_I only want for this to be true._

_It would be so much easier if it is. If I could just run away from all of this._

_…is thinking this way truly so despicable?_

Puss thought he saw the tiniest upward movement on the very edge of the Mage’s mouth, but it disappeared as quickly as it came when Sino spoke again.

“Little cat,” said this apparition of Sino, “You are the Chosen One from the Ancient Prophecy. You must take action with your own paws, rather than waste time seeking me out just to see me in the flesh. This is _your_ mistake…”

Puss felt his muscles tensed.

The sharp angles on the mage’s face softened. “…and your chance to fix it.”

Puss put his hat back onto his head to let its wide brim cast a dark shadow over his eyes. He did not want Sino to see the shame. The disgrace. The dishonour that he knew himself to be.

“…I know.”

“Then you must also know that this world and the Netherworld are on their way to collision,” followed Sino, his voice soft but imperial as it echoed throughout the black void they stood in. “And all the while, the Emperor-King whom you call Evil Puss is seeking vengeance for the crime he thinks you have inflicted upon him. As a result, everyone in San Lorenzo _suffers_.”

Sino turned around, his lustrous silken robes glistening as they followed the upward movement of his right arm—he was waving his sceptre in the air, the blue gem in it radiating a soft glow.

“And, most importantly…he knows your weakness.”

Tendrils of white smoke swam out from the darkness to approach Puss, and they slowly swirled around him as if to tempt him to dance with them. He cautiously stepped out of the circle they were making and watched with fascination as they continued to circulate inward as if gravity were somehow there, drawing them together. Eventually, they spun into themselves faster, faster, tighter and tighter until they merged, finally glowing a sharp, blinding white light that prompted him to cringe, step back, put an arm over his head to shield his eyes. When the light calmed down, he let his arm drop off to his side, and he blinked the spots away from his eyes. Before him was an image of Dulcinea—an exact copy of the Dulcinea he had engraved into his memory, every line precise and not a curve slued. The only way he knew that she was not the actual Dulcinea was the fact that this image, whatever this is, still radiated the same, white light as the tendrils of smoke had—glowing softly, gently, exactly how one would expect a ghost should.

Her back was to him, and it was with such charming innocence when she turned her head to face him.

When recognition struck her shining blue eyes, she smiled.

He felt his heart skip a beat.

“You must be fairly warned, Puss in Boots,” Sino suddenly cut through, “for your evil twin plans to take this weakness of yours in his advantage.”

Puss took a step forward. He reached out a paw to the image before him, and this representation of Dulcinea giggled before offering hers in response.

“He will capture your beloved out of your reach before you have the chance to save her.”

Dulcinea had been smiling at him, encouraging him to take her paw, to _take it_ , that there was absolutely nothing at all to fear—but as soon as he touched her, the image disintegrated into sand.

“This will be inevitable if you do not act.” He felt a hand land onto his shoulder as Sino kneeled from behind him. “Quickly.”

Puss swallowed a thick mass of—of something—that had suddenly got stuck in his throat.

“So. Using Dulcinea. This is his play.”

He enclosed his fingers upon the few white grains of sand on his palm and drew back his paw to himself.

He turned his head. Darkly spat out the words.

“…that _coward_.”

Sino bristled a bit at that before he regained himself. He stood.

“Yes…well.” Sino seemed to be carefully treading over his next words even as they seemed to smoothly flow out of his tongue. “If you truly love her…you would not let things come to that. Love…” Again, he waved his sceptre, and the blue gem in it briefly glowed. Suddenly, magically, a rose materialized from the black heavens, which then made its slow descent so Sino can gently pick it from the air. His two, long, wrinkled fingers pressed against each other on the flower’s green, tender stem, and he continued to speak, his voice strong and firm despite having been withered by age.

“It is a beautiful thing.” He ran a solemn gaze over the red rose before he once again turned his eyes to Puss. “Something divine. But you must understand,” he gravely emphasized, “that it is filled with the thorns of hardship and sacrifice. The only true way to save your beloved is to turn back time. To fix your mistake on your own. But before I instruct you on what to do…I have to make sure. To ask you one question.”

He looked at him. Held out the rose for him to take.

“Are you willing to hold the thorns?”

…and in that moment, all doubt clouding his mind disappeared.

Puss steeled his heart.

_There is no question._

He reached out and held the rose Sino offered him.

_Yes._

_I am._

…He did not see it, but a malicious grin spread over Sino’s face.

* * *

(He continued to be unaware. But the reason a wide grin had just spread over the Great Mage’s face was because he had just successfully erased Puss’ memory of his last encounter with Zuva and the rest of her babblings about searching for forbidden citadels.

That meddling Zephilim warrior had no place in the entire grand scheme of things, oh, no, no, _no_.

She must not be let into this. Zuva and the Tiny Queen’s pathetic attempts to steer his chess pieces off their paths—all of it.

Futile.

No matter what happens, the plan—the game—the _show_ —must go on.)

* * *

_That coward._

The rhythm of the soft, scratchy strokes of pen over parchment was somehow a warm blanket of comfort in the cold gloom of the Mayor’s bedchamber.

That _coward_.

As the grandfather clock ticked away in the background, the moonlight streamed in through the open windows, illuminating his—or Mayor Temeroso’s—writing desk at the absence of a lamplight.

Evil Puss sat alone in the room, busy and immersed in his writing. At least, he was _trying_ to _focus_. Each letter he imprinted on the parchment was a unique, foreign rune of archaic descent. It had been difficult at first to translate the original English to Kajiuran, the language of the witches, but now he had more or less memorized each of the one hundred thirty-nine letters of the runic alphabet.

It was fairly difficult to focus when doubt was beginning to rear its ugly head from where he thought he’d already shoved it down to its death in the abyss of his subconscious.

_Coward._

…Puss’ words continued to resonate within him.

Scimitar, that feisty imp of a sword, had opted to sleep outside the chamber and in the Mayor’s office in the meantime. The Scimitar had long ago made it clear to him that magical swords never _needed_ to sleep, obviously, but it was nonetheless a luxury he’d be a fool to never take. Also, he never liked it when Evil Puss had to engage himself in another one of his businesses with that ‘mind sorcerer’—he’d scoff that it was because he never “liked the way he _vibed_. He gives me the creeps. Yeeshk.”

And what an appropriate nickname that was. _Mind Sorcerer_. But not only that. The Scimitar actually had a handful of monickers for _it_ , actually.

The Evil Invader. The Wicked Ventriloquist. The Mind Controller. 

The No More.

Evil Puss had never exactly been certain who this parasite was…but he _can_ be certain that it _existed_. At least, he had proof that it did.

Proof that no one on their right mind would believe, anyway. Because the parasite _lived_ in his brain.

Somehow.

It was a constant presence giving him friendly reminders of what he needed to do to uphold his end of their bargain.

 _Friendly_ reminders, meaning _spikes of pain all over his body_.

That was all the proof Evil Puss needed to know that this…No More… _did_ exist.

And how could he believe it did not? After all, the story of his vengeance began when this dark voice had, somehow, managed to reach out to him. After very nearly escaping the mighty stomp of K’fhoggnarh, Evil Puss had been able to transport himself back to his own homeworld—a whopping ten years into its future. For years he had been the Emperor of his people, that was true—he even had an entire wolf army who obeyed him unquestioningly. At least, all that fame and glory and fortune was _before_ he suddenly got so unceremoniously sucked into the Netherworld to be entangled in the domestic life of San Lorenzo.

And it seemed that in his absence, the Empire he left back in his homeworld had grown their guts. They had shooed and scattered his wolf army away so they could finally get to live in the ‘peace’ and ‘harmony’ that the ‘vicious’ dogs had stolen from them decades ago. But, upon his return and near escape from the stomp of K’fhoggnarh, he was arrested—as commanded by the ruler who succeeded him, Empress Dulcinea. He was put in a trial that might as well have only been mockingly conducted for the pleasure of the masses, then thrown into prison on the grounds of corruption, abuse of power, and multiple frustrated and completed murder, ten years ago in their world when he still sat on his throne.

He’d rolled his eyes during most of the entire fiasco. Really, he thought the people were dramatizing everything he’d ever done in his rule a bit. It isn’t that he didn’t take pride out of the ‘Evil’ title, it was just that he knew that he wasn’t completely _evil_ , he just…had an iron fist that anyone too weak will find themselves cowering in fear before.

And it is usually those who are driven by fear who act the most drastically.

So, after his mock trial and having been thrown into his high-security prison cell, he wallowed in his humiliation and utter defeat. And while wallowing, he had suddenly heard a _voice_.

He remembered it so clearly. He had thought it was just his faculties beginning to rot away, having spent most of his time—whole, entire years, although he could never be actually certain—just staring at the metal walls.

And the voice…it was old, and raspy, and so incredibly faint, but it was _there_. In his brain. Like a parasite.

 ** _Free me_** , had been its first words, heavy and scratchy and breathy, **_free me from these chains, and I shall free you from yours._**

He had been so desperate to get out of his miserable, godforsaken life at the time that he’d immediately agreed without another second thought that he was speaking to a voice in his _brain_.

And ever since he met this _Voice_ —if one could ever _meet_ a voice—the course of his entire life suddenly took a dramatic turn.

The Voice had promised to give him the freedom and the vengeance he craved. Vengeance against Puss in Boots.

The Voice had lent him knowledge of the dark arts so he was able to escape from his prison in a snap of his fingers.

The Voice had helped him gather his scattered wolves again to reform his army.

The Voice had led him to a mage—the Artephius of his world—so the mage could, albeit unwillingly, recreate the mercuric chalk for him. He needed to recreate one. He’d accidentally left his own in the Netherworld upon his escape.

The Voice had instructed him that the mercuric chalk shall help him travel between worlds, conquer one empire after another to fill his insatiable desires.

The Voice had helped him every step of the way so that he reached this point in time where he was so close, so unbelievably close, to finally, _finally_ executing his long-awaited retribution upon Puss in Boots.

But…he had made this mysterious Voice wait for almost a year.

Evil Puss had acquired his powers and even the Scimitar because of this Voice whose sole want was to be freed from whatever prison was caging him. This entire dance began when they’d shook on the bargain, and Evil Puss’ sole want for vengeance had been the choreographer. He can admit that he _may_ have gone a little overboard on the favours—after all, he’d asked for an army, to be lent knowledge of the dark arts, to regain the mind manipulation powers that he’d previously had back in the Netherworld, without having to use restrictive bracelets this time, of course.

And all this time he’d repeatedly told this Voice to wait, wait, _wait_ , _I shall free you only_ ONCE _I finally unleash my wrath upon Puss in Boots._

So it should not have come as a surprise to him, really, that the Voice was seriously pissed upon knowing that Evil Puss failed to contain Puss and Dulcinea within San Lorenzo, that they’d escaped, that he’d been so _close_ to _finally_ doing it, but still ultimately missing the mark.

Tonight, Evil Puss had felt the Voice’s anger course throughout his entire body for the second time since they’d first met.

The first time was when he’d told the Voice that his freedom would have to wait for perhaps another year, because Puss in Boots and his company of misfits had yet to arrive from the Netherworld.

The second time was tonight. The Voice was angry that he’d have to wait for longer before his promised freedom.

The experience was…painful.

It was too late to realize that he’d made a contract with a devil.

And he felt like such a coward, fearing that _pain_ , every second rife with the anxiety of not knowing when it would come to set every nerve on his body on fire again. He’d sent out most of his wolf army to the Forbidden Citadel to free… _It_ , already, even if he hadn’t yet completed his final act of vengeance….

And it was because he was afraid.

Did that make him a coward? To fear pain?

It bothered him greatly. Only, why _should_ he be bothered? One way or another, he was finally going to receive the justice he deserved. Wasn’t he?

After all, the only remaining step was to draw Puss in Boots back into San Lorenzo. Make him _think_ he had to do it for the good of everything he held precious.

And then…

He won’t _kill_ him, of course. That was far too barbaric. And besides.

That would only create a mess that he was too proud to clean with his paws.

Oh, no no _no_.

 _Murder_ was too kind.

A smirk spread onto his face as he proceeded to write the final instructions of the spell on his parchment.

His vengeance…it held nothing but misery for Puss in Boots. Of crippling isolation. He’d make him feel what it was like, living entrapped in the cage of one’s own mind, with no hope of ever getting out—until he _tears_ himself out in shreds.

And even then, he’d never be given the gift of peace. Of Death. Puss in Boots would be made immortal in a world that Evil Puss had specifically designed to make his soul writhe in _pain_ , every excruciating second.

It was sufficient price to pay for the injustice that _he_ had experienced.

He sat back. Admired the work of his paw.

_Are you sure this spell is correct?_

He reached out to flick away some imaginary dust from his parchment while he waited for the answer.

 ** _Yes_** , the Voice whispered in his mind after a little while. **_But what are you writing that spell for? I thought you will execute it yourself…considering that you have me to assist._**

He got up, rolling the parchment into a scroll. A satisfied smile was settling on his face, having stomped his self-doubt into oblivion seconds ago.

 _Believe me_ , he told the Voice, far too smug about the manipulative dreamworks he’d recently been inflicting upon two particularly annoying felines’ minds.

_I have it all planned._

_Soon…_ everything _will come full circle._

He left his desk. Walked outside his dark, moonlit chamber. Swung the door close.

It was worth noting, however, that the lone rose, supposedly in the pot by his window where he kept his dolls…

The rose was no longer there.

* * *

He woke up with a gasp.

Puss was breathless, and he was panting, like he’d been underwater all this time and only now had he finally gotten the chance to fill his deprived lungs with precious air again.

For a moment, he simply sat there, trying to stabilize his pounding heart.

It took him a while to get him to recognize where he was. The vast star-filled nightsky was spread from above him like a blanket, stopping where it met the desert’s end to kiss the horizon.

He’s in the middle of the Western Desert. Of nowhere.

He looked beside him and found Dulcinea curled up in herself. Asleep.

He heard movement from behind him. He turned his head, only to be greeted by Babieca’s worried, beady black eyes.

A faint smile managed to creep its way onto his lips despite the disorientation he still found himself in. “I am okay, Babieca.”

Babieca softly whinnied his disagreement, looking angry.

Puss blinked at him. He tried to recall what happened before this that made Babieca look so angry, and then…

His last memory of being awake was…was his mind being forcefully shut down, and then collapsing on the sand.

_Oh._

_Right._

Yes, he supposed that warranted Babieca’s worry.

Just as Puss brought himself to his boots, however….

He noticed that he was holding a rose in his right paw.

He stared at it for a moment, wondering where he could have gotten himself a rose in the middle of the desert’s adversity.

And then he _remembered_.

The world. San Lorenzo. _Sino—_

He felt the ground steeply angling itself so that he slid over it before he gained balance—no, apparently it was _he_ who had lost balance, not the ground, as Babieca made it clear when the steed further neighed his worry.

Puss took a breath. Strengthened his resolve. Fisted his paws.

He knew what he had to do.

_Sino had made his instructions clear._

“Babieca,” he said, careful to keep his voice low lest he woke Dulcinea up from her slumber. Babieca got up on his four legs, eagerly responding to the command in Puss’ voice. “Let us go back to San Lorenzo.”

He mounted himself up on his steed’s back. But before he completely turned away, he gave both the rose in his paw and Dulcinea—still blissfully asleep—one last look.

…it was with a chest constricting in on itself that Puss lightly tapped his boot against Babieca’s side to urge the steed to run his fastest speed.

To run, run, _run_ as fast as he could, because this is the only way he knew _how_.

This will be a long night, possibly because the next sunrise will never happen at all.

* * *

Hundreds of them marched through the dark forest.

“He…doesn’t really mean for us to _go_ there, does he?”

The voice wasn’t that loud, but the entire army heard what was said. And there was a palpable pause in the air as the knife in the words sank in each and every heart.

A rumble of nervous whispers rose among the ranks.

Apparently, Sarge was the first one who spoke up that morbid thought that he knew silently haunted them all since this journey began.  

“Scimitar…he says it’s dangerous….”

“But why would he _want_ us to go there?”

“There must be a reason it’s called _Forbidden._ ”

“And we might die.”

The Alpha wolf solemnly bowed his head as he continued to trudge ahead.

Hearing that last statement come from their leader effectively made the nervous whispers spiral into mad fright, and now the pause in their march ahead morphed into a retreat as each wolf made a trembling, hesitant step back.

“No we _aren’t!_ ” was the vehement riposte of the Beta in an attempt to get back the pack’s morale. “We’re just going to drop in and free the prisoner. What’s so hard about _that?_ ”

The Alpha glared at him. “There must be a reason why he wanted an _entire army_ to pick up _just one prisoner_.”

“Yeah, don’tcha worry, everything’s gunnabe _fine_ ,” said the Beta, smiling for the sake of everyone else and putting an arm around his leader in a show of casual companionship. He’d hissed the last part in his sentence though, wanting to get it through his Alpha’s skull that it would _not_ do well to frighten everybody out of their minds. “And besides,” continued the Beta, raising his voice to a volume to make sure everybody heard, “you haven’t heard any tales about the people _dying_ from this _dangerous_ Forbidden Citadel, have you? No, am I right? So everyone, keep marchin’ on!”

There might have been a collected sigh of relief after their Beta’s reassurance, and the pack again continued to move.

It was, perhaps, an hour later that the Alpha leaned to the Beta to speak again.

“That’s the thing,” whispered the leader, still anxious but now aware not to spread it to everyone else. “Dead men tell no tales.”

That got each thread of the Beta’s mangy fur rising to their ends.

The two of them heard someone clear their throat from behind them. When they turned their heads, they found that it was Sarge.

“Hey,” Sarge said when both the Alpha and the Beta turned their heads to face him. “We’ve sworn loyalty to the Emperor-King because…he brought all of us back together again. Remember, while he was gone? Empress Dulcinea kicked our asses out of the empire so that we starved out in the _cold_. But then he came back. He came back to save us.” He gave a weak smile. “So we stick to this job. A’right?”

The smile that spread on the Alpha’s face was one of disbelief. The grin that spread on the Beta’s face, on the other paw…

“You’re right, Sarge,” said the Beta in that rare moment of sentiment. “Let’s get this job over with.”

And so the lupine brotherhood continued to sally forth, their master’s order continuing to propel them forward.

(They were dogs, after all.)

* * *

_I…_

_I am sorry._

_I have to leave, I do not want to, but I am so sorry—_

_There is no other way, Dulcinea…none that I know of._

_I am such a_ fool _._

_But I have to do this._

_I am sorry._

* * *

_the end of part i: the fall of san lorenzo.  
_


	12. Neck, No Neck

**Part II**  
**The Battle for San Lorenzo**

* * *

  _Who forces time is pushed back by time; who yields to time finds time by his side.  
~the Talmud_

* * *

 

The moon travelled across the blood-black sky with unwavering purpose as if to follow a destined path. The night was young, the darkness deep, the shadows all-encompassing. With his noble galloping stallion, the one gato who dared venture out into the night battled the Western Desert’s cold, harsh winds, its gusts of sand attempting to strike him blind, its deafening, suffocating silence—he kept his gaze straight ahead, not for a second letting the demons of his mind reign supreme. He will not be weathered. He will endure.

Puss in Boots was determined to persevere.

For San Lorenzo.

As the shadow of a huge, single mass of stone approached, Babieca’s gait slowed.

They continued to move at a careful canter, their shadows following them, the bold chalk walls of stone rising around them, until they stopped a distance right before the arch of stone bricks.

Puss felt his paws close tight over themselves as his glowing chartreuse eyes gazed at the empty spot over the boulder where the Sphinx was supposed to be sleeping.

All he wanted was for everything to be back to normal again.

He took a breath. Drew out his sword.

If this plan succeeded, then it _will_ be.

The rider hopped off his horse’s back, both his boots softly thudding against the ground so that no grain of sand was disturbed.

For a moment, he stood there in a defensive stance, every muscle tight with tension, every sense on high alert.

When no monster leapt from the shadows to pin him to the floor as he had initially expected, he felt his muscles relax, but only minutely. He returned his sword to its rightful place on his belt, though he cautiously made it certain that it did not brush against the metal ring. He had to be quiet about this. He had to be cautious for a set-up. But he did turn to Babieca to tell his steed to stay, to keep himself hidden, because it would be best if Puss faced the possible dangers lurking further down this path alone.

San Lorenzo was a town embedded in a giant piece of rock, cobblestone paths spiralling around it from bottom to top. Houses of clay baked by the desert sun trailed the paths, and the community, or what was left of it, became denser and denser as Puss ascended to the town proper—akin to a valiant knight travelling up the highest room of a tower to rescue his imprisoned beloved. He jumped from roof to roof—or whatever you call what was left of each dwelling’s weathered rooftop— careful not to slip lest he drew attention to himself. He was on all fours, his front paws softly padding against wherever they landed, his trained back ones careful to not let his boots make a sound. He was quick and silent as the night, a mere shadow that disappeared as soon as the eye caught it—true as ever to his feline assets. He forced himself to stop lamenting about the crisp scent of smoke in the air, of that scorched, black wall, that destroyed window, the dilapidated houses, the unmade chimneys, the scattered pieces of gold and the…

No, he kept his gaze ahead.

Until, finally—

“What. Was. _That?_ ”

The voice belonged to Evil Puss, and he did not sound happy. 

Puss promptly hid behind a chimney as he internally fired a steady string of Spanish profanity at himself for his utter _incompetence_.

He had almost slipped on a brick in his haste, and caught himself just in time—but not without a small gasp escaping his lips.

He closed his eyes and pressed himself against the bricked wall. His heart pounded in his chest. Hoping against hope that they were simply going to let it _go_.

That this, too, shall pass.

“…it’s probably nothing, Evil Puss,” he heard the Scimitar claim, his voice as distinct and obnoxious as ever even from a distance. “Probably just a stray who taught this town was its home. Let the poor tom think it _is_.”

A pause. “…alright.”

After that, the thick tension that had briefly enveloped Puss like a block of ice seemed to evaporate, and the air began to be breathable again.

He knew that the odd way the Scimitar phrased it should have sparked suspicion in him, but he supposed the feline metaphors were simply because the magical sword had never been as involved with too many cats in his lifetime as before.

He risked a peek down.

Puss had been wondering where all the wolves were, since the town seemed so empty and soulless. It certainly was not the state he had anticipated it to be in, the moment he entered San Lorenzo. He’d expected to be swarmed, to do battle if he was caught, and he’d been prepared, he had a _plan_ —but it seemed that the lunar god had decided to be in his favour, since the so-called ‘army’ of Evil Puss had been reduced to fifteen, twenty wolves.

Down there, behind the shoe orphanage, the dogs were lined up, and Evil Puss was instructing them on things to do—with occasional, haughty pipe-ups from the Scimitar. As he watched, Puss briefly wondered since when San Lorenzo had built itself some sort of military squad courtyard…until he realized a moment later that this small patch of freedom behind the orphanage was supposed to be the orphans’ _vegetable garden_.

Anger churned in his veins.

How dare they.

How _dare_ they reduce the children’s garden of innocence into this—this courtyard of corruption?

“…and we do _not_ want that happening again. _Do we?_ ”

The wolves bowed their heads in shame.

 _Orders_. Puss realized that Evil Puss was sending out orders for his soldiers to stay alert.

Not only that, but he was _scolding_ them for their recent screw up about the earlier rebellion.

The night air was bitingly cold, but that was not what suddenly made a sneaky chill crawl up his spine.

It was the fact that this small, ginger tabby cat with merely a talking sword and a cavalier outfit could manage to make ranks of dogs—no, an army of _wolves_ —practically _kneel_ before him.

Puss looked at his own paws. This much capacity for domination, tyranny, and destruction…lying dormant in his palms this whole time?

Truly, he had many reasons to be glad that he was himself, but right now…he thought he’d found the greatest reason of all.

He recalled Dulcinea’s words. _You’re letting him call weak what you find your strength in, and that isn’t something I would stand for._

He gave himself the briefest of smiles. He thought he deserved it.

_You may call me weak._

_But at least I am not evil._

And that may just turn out to be his greatest strength.

Evil Puss’ lecture went on and on, eventually becoming a blur to his ears once he tore his eyes away from them to instead look at Artephius’ owl-faced dwelling.

_Ruined, but not quite._

He focused his gaze back to the Treasure House.

_So near, yet so far._

He looked behind him to make sure that Evil Puss and his evil company were immersed in their evil deeds enough to let him do this. Fortunately, they were.

He had to seize his one shot at this.

The plaza was clear.

He took a small breath to brace himself.

He pushed himself from chimney, made two quick steps down the slope of the roof, and threw himself into the air—briefly spinning before softly landing on his boots and a palm on the ground. He lifted his eyes and focused them onto the Treasure House.

He released the breath he’d been holding.

He ran across the plaza, stepped over scattered gold coins and treasure, skipped up the stairs, threw the doors open.

He had one last treasure to retrieve.

_“Artephius!”_

It was a mere whisper when he shrilled it out, but everyone who had been asleep—or who looked like they were asleep—was shocked awake by the sudden upset in the dead of night.

“ _Puss?_ ” said Artephius from where he was trapped in his cage, “Why did you get here?”

Puss panickedly drew back to close the doors before anyone from the outside could hear, the seemingly inherent green light in his irises becoming more pronounced as the darkness came to engulf them again. He proceeded to hiss at the town’s resident mage as he approached him, careful to not let his own voice rise in volume.

“Keep it down, Artephius—I really very _really_ need to—”

_“…Puss in the Boots?!”_

The gato cringed as he felt every pair of eyes pin themselves upon him to cripple him in place. Perhaps he hadn’t braced his mental faculties enough for this.

“Hey…why are you alone?”

“Where’s Dulcinea?”

“You’ve come back to rescue us, haven’t you?”

_“But where is she?”_

So this was how it was like, being a moth. Being pinned down the observation board.

He forced himself to calm down. No reason to panic. This was his family.

They were not angry. Not at him.

_…not yet._

“Yes,” he slowly drew out, turning on his heel to face them, but not really. “Everything, will be…” _Oh, how cruel the truth could be._ “…back…as it had once been.” He let his eyes gaze over where his evil bastard counterpart had defiled the sacred spot where Sino’s statue was _supposed_ to be with that vainglorious throne.

For a moment, he relished the feeling of blood boiling in veins. He’d been drenched in anxiety and self-doubt for far too long that anger and hatred—the thick, hot _poison_ they brought—had never felt so _good_.

“This, I swear.” And he had never meant that vow as truly as he did now. “But for that to be possible…” He turned to face the old mage again.

He would let this one word slip from his tongue _once_.

“Artephius. I…”

_Once._

“…I need your help.”

Artephius dived into it unhesitatingly.

“Well,” he said, sounding as jolly as his usual self, curiosity taking on a definite gleam in his eyes, “what can I do for you, then, buddy?”

Puss wondered if it was a sign that something was terribly wrong with how his brain was wired when he was shocked that Artephius, or anybody else in this echoing chamber, did not even pause to mock him for _needing_ help.

He released the smallest sighs of relief. He should have known. This was his family. They would never do that to him.

“I think,” he said, carefully, just like how he had practised it on his way to San Lorenzo, “that it would be better if we discussed this matter in your home. Owlberto.” He forced himself to ignore the curious whispers that rose among the San Lorenzans in his peripheral vision.

Artephius’ brows tangled themselves up in confusion.

“Huh? But Owlberto is—“

“Destroyed, yes,” like everything _else_ in San Lorenzo, “but your scrolls and your spells and your various other books _must_ still be inside.” Puss went to his cage to grip on its bars and look intently into Artephius’ eyes, willing to make the alchemist understand just how urgent this matter was to the grand scheme of things. “ _Please_. It will mean the end of San Lorenzo, the end of the world, if you do not help me.”

And, for the grand finale—a stroke to the ego.

“You are my only hope.”

And, truly, the moment would have achieved its maximum potential for intensity if the Duchess _hadn’t_ so rudely barged in and so dramatically popped the bubble.

“Ugh!” groaned the Duchess in her deep, riffling, thickly-accented voice, “ _you’re_ the tulpa, Caroline! Why don’t you tell them how to summon Sino to just get us the heck out of here?!”

“ _Not_ Caroline!” Cleevil yelled from where she was. “I know you’re doing this on purpose, Duchess! MY NAME IS CLEEVIL!”

_“Whatever!”_

But as the two continued bickering about the goblin girl’s name, something clicked in Puss’ mind.

… _Sino?_

There was…something.

Something fluttering at the surface of his memories. Something forgotten. Something important.

Something he _had_ to do.

Something about…searching out for Sino…in a… _citadel?_

The thoughts forming in his mind were so terribly abstract that it was impossible to express them into words—so before he could completely remember what it was, or _who_ said it to him, or _when_ the memory was even made, it suddenly got yanked back down into the deep depths of his conscious. And the feeling, that fluttering feeling of remembering something _important_ , was immediately gone—

_No. I have to focus on the task at hand._

Puss had not prepared himself for this unexpected turn of conversation, but he did manage to remain calm as he seethed out the words, immediately cutting off the Duchess’ and Cleevil’s squabble.

“So, Duchess. Cleevil is a tulpa. How come you have never told us this?”

The Duchess had the gall to think _she_ had the right to blink back at him. “Uhhh, _Puss_? Weren’t you _listening_ to me back then?”

Now what was this about? “Listening to _what?_ ”

The Duchess sighed. She got up from her comfortable seat on the floor, put a hand on her back as if it hurt, and then proceeded to wave her other one into the air, magically making space ripple into itself like water, forming colours, sounds, conjuring memories—

Of her talking to Artephius as they went shopping down into the Thieves’ Market.

_“…and I know that I need apples and oranges, perhaps celeries and cabbages—oh, and I brought a tulpa to San Lorenzo, and let’s see—ah, a sprinkle of amaranth flower spice, a dollop of homemade star aniseed potion, and—did I mention I brought a tulpa to San Lorenzo? Arty! Are you LISTENING to me?!”_

She snapped her fingers and the image fell apart like water, though nothing splashed against the ground. The Duchess then sent Puss a deadpan look, as if it was _his_ fault he didn’t catch her saying that important piece of information while shopping with Artephius in the Thieves’ Market. Puss had, after all, been the one to escort them there to let them do their regular shopping, once upon a time.

Puss’ eye twitched. He threw his head back.

Miserably whispered to the ceiling, “Have you completely forsaken me, Felina?”

“For the last time… _HEY!_ Everybody listen to _ME!_ ” All heads turned to Cleevil, who was grumpily grasping the bars on her cage, her eyes big and bulging out of her face in utter disbelief. “Stop talking about me as if _I’m_ not here, please? Thanks. How many times do I have to tell y’all? I. Am. NOT. _A TULPA!_ I’m a _goblin!_ ”

The Duchess sounded like she was muttering something along the lines of _stupid innocent_ arrogant _little lady_ behind the big fat palm that covered her mouth and the rest of her face, but when she did remove it, her expression was back to its previously exhausted countenance. “I told you, Cleevil,” she insisted, “Sino must have hidden it from you! You just _have_ to keep searching inside you, and you _will_ find your true calling!”

“Calling _schmalling_ ,” the small green goblin shrilled back at her, “I’ve been a goblin all my life!”

The Duchess threw her arms into the air before collapsing back into her spot on the floor in frustrated surrender.

Puss had a distant feeling that this was not the first time they had this conversation.

“Nuh- _uh!_ ” came the signature whine of the Sphinx and Puss had to turn around twice to look for where she was until finally spotting her _there_ , not caged but her ankles chained, beside the Igualdemontijos and the terrified Mayor Temeroso. The Sphinx scoffed and rolled her eyes. “I’ve seen _goblins_ , you know, and they don’t have a neck, but _you_ have a neck, so it’s, like, totes freaking me out!”

Puss narrowed his eyes to see past the Sphinx’s cage and blocked out the noise as the rest of them argued over Cleevil’s goblinhood.

_Was that…Sino’s stone statue?_

He stared at the shadowed stone for a moment longer, wondering how Evil Puss got the statue removed from its rightful spot at the heart of the Treasure House without getting a single scratch on its entire form. It was hidden behind the cages where some of the San Lorenzans were locked in, sufficiently blanketed by the shadows, which may explain how he missed the huge thing before. The statue lied on its side, undermining the might it was supposed to impose upon anyone who looked upon it.

…and then, all of a sudden, the gem on its eye suddenly glinted red all on its own as if to slap him away from staring at it.  

Puss staggered away as if from the physical force with a paw over his eyes, but nobody noticed.

Because everyone else was too engrossed in the argument about Cleevil’s uniqueness in terms of her possession of a neck.

“… _See?_ ” The Duchess apparently had to conjure a book to expressly convince Cleevil into thinking about the possibility that she actually might _not_ be a goblin. The Eldritch Witch waved her hand to direct the flight of her little book until it stopped right before Cleevil where she could plainly see. On the old, yellowed page of the book was an artist’s representation of a tall creature that instead had blubber where a neck should be, marked underneath as ‘Goblin’—and when the Duchess magically flipped the book’s page, it revealed another image of a thin, short creature with a long neck, helpfully marked underneath as ‘Not Goblin’.

The Duchess quickly flipped from one page or another in her eagerness to drill into Cleevil’s head the difference of a goblin and a not-goblin.

“Neck, no neck. Neck, no neck. Neck, no neck. Neck, no neck! _Honestly,_ Clair _,_ can’t you _see?_ ”

The goblin girl slapped a hand to her face. “Still Cleevil.”

“Whatever! Just answer my question! Do you see the difference or not?!”

“Ugh. Okay, well.” Cleevil narrowed her large eyes and tapped at her bottom lip with two fingers as she carefully examined the ‘Goblin’ drawing. She hummed in thought before finally drawing back, albeit hesitatingly. “…I guess I…s’pose that makes sense, uh-huh? I mean, other than the obvious… _neck_ thing…” She gestured wildly at the ‘Goblin’ image on the book as if she genuinely didn’t know what to make of it, “I _can’t_ do curses, like normal goblins do. All this time I thought I was just a dry shell.”

“Oh, _come on_ , don’t be so hard on ya’self,” insisted Kid Pickles.

Cleevil was unconvinced. “Ugh, believe me, I _tried_.” She then turned to face Toby whose cage was right across her, and who was just innocently trying to eat a banana. Cleevil extended her hand so her palm faced Toby, concentrating deeply, she said, “Curse, curse, _curse!_ ” And when nothing happened, she turned back to face Kid Pickles and, “ _See?_ Nada.”

Unfortunately, she did not see Toby slip over thin air, slam to the ground face first, and burst out crying.

…Kid Pickles did.

He took a bite out of his pickle in response.

 _“Enough of this!”_ Everyone was immediately silenced at that latest outburst and all turned to face the ginger gato standing at the centre of the chamber. Once he had the attention he called for, Puss sighed, realizing how exhausted this entire ordeal was making him. He was willingly spreading himself too thin for these people, and he had no regrets in his heart in having to do so, but they were running out of time, and that was what they were _wasting_. He had heard enough of their exchange about the possibility of Cleevil being a tulpa, and though it was promising news, it was evident they were only going to go run around in endless circles if they ever decided to pursue that thread.

And he had no shame in explicitly stating so.

“We are getting _nowhere_. The two of us really _must_ get going.” He unsheathed a claw, went to Artephius’ cage, fiddled with its lock, and swung the door open, all in the space of five seconds—to the wide-eyed shock of everybody including Pajuna. Puss took the old mage’s hand to assist him out of his cold, cramped space, and the tall man had to duck to keep from hitting his head against the too-low metal ceiling. The Duchess’ expressive eyes worriedly followed Artephius as he got out—the wolves had made sure to throw the Eldritch Witch into a cage _separate_ from Artephius upon realizing that combining the two powerful sorcerers in the same cage was a bad idea.

Puss saw how her eyes shone with worry for Artephius, so he let his gaze soften. “Do not worry, Duchess.” Then, he faced everybody else. For the first time truly _doing_ so. “Fear not, San Lorenzans. I _will_ free all of you, and everything…”

Suddenly, it was like the words were stuck in his throat.

_He cannot say them._

“Everything…will…”

That single word echoed emptily inside the seemingly hollow space of his head.

_…Everything._

“Everything…will be back as it had once been.”

If he hadn’t had more self-control, he would’ve have choked in his own tears right then and there.

And of course, since no one knew the underlying meaning in his words, each citizen’s face lit up, so brightly, with _hope_ —because for once in a very long time, someone gave them a reason to.

And as Puss stood there, he made certain to etch every single smiling San Lorenzan’s face into his memory, ( _yes_ , even Eames’), to have something to look back to, something to help remind himself that he had given his everything to protect these humble townspeople at the cost of his very undoing, till the very end.

He clenched a paw around the hilt of his sword before forcibly tearing his eyes away and back to the work that needed to be done. “Come, Artephius,” he said, crisply, hurrying to the door, “we must make haste.”

_“Puss!”_

His boot had just been about to make another smooth slide across the ground. He turned.

“Yes?”

Cleevil oddly looked _very_ conflicted about this whole arrangement. “Can I…come with you?”

Ah. For this, he had prepared a line.

“It is too dangerous to venture outside these walls, bonita,” he said, smiling as an adult would to a child. “The less we are, the less chances we have being caught. Actually,” he compulsively added, even if it was going off the script, “you know what? Even up until now…I am…”

He looked into Cleevil’s eyes.

Truly _looked_ into them.

He found that he was stuck stuttering the same words. “…I…am…”

 _Darn it_. This was _not_ part of his original speech. He would have preferred to keep the sentimentality down to a minimum, but what choice did he have—rudely stop in the middle of the sentence?

He released a breath. “I am thankful. For the day you found your home in San Lorenzo, Cleevil. Just as I have.”

He briefly gave the Sphinx a glance. Then the Duchess. Then Cleevil again.

Dulcinea was correct. About so many things. Because in that moment, standing in the middle of it all, he realized that his arrival in San Lorenzo had not been all that terrible.

Maybe, if he had never arrived in San Lorenzo, Cleevil would never have found her home, the Sphinx would be stuck in her job of guarding the Hourglass of Eurythion for eternity, and the Duchess—well, the Duchess would have remained evil, and she would never have begun her journey to self-rediscovery.

This. This was his doing. All the bad things…and all the good things.

His arrival in San Lorenzo may have blanketed the town in the darkness they have been suffocating under, but because of it, because of that darkness, he had let these stars _shine_.

He had, in a way…changed the life of these people. Given them light.

_Which is why I plan to turn back to the time before I had ever so foolishly opened the portal to the Netherworld._

He had decided earlier, as he rode Babieca to San Lorenzo, that he will turn back time—but not to the very beginning. Because no.

How could he dare have the heart to _undo_ meeting San Lorenzo? To undo meeting Dulcinea?

He shall discuss the consequences of this action to Artephius later, but for now, he had business to take care of—

“Hey, Puss in the Boots…!”

It was Señora Zapata, and she stood up from where she sat, cradling a sleeping Esme in her arms. Puss threw her a questioning look. Señora Zapata looked like she was hesitating whether to speak or not, but then, surprising him enough, she suddenly blurted out—

“Be careful… all right?”

His eyes widened.

Something ached in his heart.

But before he had the time to process his emotions of disbelief, Pajuna interjected, “Zapata’s right. We need our hero alive to celebrate after all this is done.” The Scottish bovine barkeeper threw the bangs out of her eyes and smirked at him. “I’d get the cantina ready for a party, so don’t you dare die out there, laddie.”

“Yes, of course,” he said, smirking right back, then forced out the lie—“I will see all of you again.”

“Oh, and Puss?” He arched a brow at the Duchess, who was just getting up but this time with her magic gear in her arms. “I think you’re going to need _this_.”

She revealed that she still had the magic soul jar of Klaus von Braunschweig. For the transformation spell.

“ _Ugh_ , Maldonna,” whined von Braunschweig as the Duchess put his glowing green jar in place onto her gear, “I’m already tired! Depleted, wasted, _exhausted!_ I don’t think have enough soul power to—“

“I think what he’s _trying_ to say is,” interrupted the Duchess, then looked up to Puss and Artephius.

“I have enough to transform the two of you.”

Puss smiled, and it felt _good_ , because for once in a long, long time, he did not have to force it.

For once, things were actually going pretty well in his favour.

So far.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’ve been listening to Yuki Kajiura’s Decretum (Latin for Decision) while writing this, a soundtrack from the critically-acclaimed Puella Magi Madoka Magica series by Gen Urobuchi. If you’re familiar of PMMM, you may notice that a lot of what’s going to happen in the future (or should I say past?) is directly inspired by the events of this anime. 
> 
> The violin is dominant, but the background guitar strums make the piece fit in with the Spanish spin of this fairy tale. It’s the glorious sound produced by the collision of Puss in Boots, desperation, and magic. 
> 
> Here's the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDrb3lX1--o


	13. Who Forces Time

There were various joys that came with being a non-talking horse.

For one, he didn’t have to deal with other creature-things and all their exhausting small talk. Babieca certainly enjoyed most of his time in solitude and he’d really rather _not_ have another petty, noisy beast destroy his peace.

Secondly, he had little to no reason to get involved in their affairs. After all, who would want to open up to a horse about their problems at home? They couldn’t even be sure if he even understood. Therefore, most people left him alone.

Third…well. Not being able to talk made others assume that he had sub-normal intelligence, and having one’s intellectual capacity underestimated by others was a real advantage he was smart enough to utilize to his favour.

Babieca stepped back from his handiwork, pleased with the result of having spent hours each and every night practising his calligraphy. He must admit, he’d become pretty good at this. He rubbed his hoof against a rock to get rid of the clinging sand. After passing the critical scrutiny of his inner critic, the young foal in him smiled and erupted from his heart, and he neighed his delight like only an equine artist would. 

He had successfully calligraphed each and every letter of his name— _Babieca_ , with the tail of the last letter _a_ making a long curve that spiralled into itself—beautifully and elegantly using only a hoof and a patch of desert sand. The calligraphed letters had thickness, and volume, and _soul_.

He had reason to be proud of himself.

He continued to add his final touches on his handiwork, only stepping back on occasion to reverently gaze at it before carefully reaching out again with his hoof to correct an imagined erroneous hoofstroke.

This peace would have gone on for hours and hours and he wouldn’t even have noticed.

At least, that would’ve been his preference.

For suddenly, in the dead of the night, a cavalry sword fell from heaven, cut through the air, and sang its metallic song before its tip hit the tittle of the letter _i_ —and if Babieca hadn’t pulled his hoof back just in time, he would have been seriously decapitated.

The shocked stallion looked up and saw a boot-clad cat standing on the edge of the sandstone cliff, his entire form shadowed by the shining silver moon behind him. The figure chuckled before jumping down from his position, gracefully landing his two boots onto the ground to destroy Babieca’s entire calligraphic masterpiece altogether.

He pulled his sword out of the ground and stepped forward, smirking as insufferably as ever.

Babieca skittishly bucked back, his legs stiff, his back arched, his tail agitatedly swishing back and forth— _angry_.

_Evil Puss and the Scimitar._

What are these two doing here?

“Oh, no, don’t be _frightened_ , my friend,” cooed Evil Puss in those tantalizing tones of his, and Babieca had half a mind to roll his eyes. If he had the ability to retort, well, he wouldn’t have hesitated to express: _oh, certainly, the huge sword is NOT at all very effective in inducing horror, not to mention it had almost cut my hoof off!_

And his _dominant_ hoof for that matter! If he had it cut, he wouldn’t ever be able to do calligraphy the same again!

Evil Puss must have noticed him staring horrifically at the Scimitar—the sharp, long, curving blade that had countless times before chopped heads off of shoulders—and he laughed. “Ach, where are my manners? I apologize for throwing the sword at you from above, that was very impolite of me.”

Babieca whinnied at him, his tone angry. _What do you want from me?_

“What I want from you is simple,” responded Evil Puss, smoothly and gracefully without missing a beat. The white stallion arched a brow at him. _He understands?_ “In fact,” continued the cat, “I just want you to go.”

Okay, now _that_ was suspicious. What could he possibly—

Evil Puss smirked up at him. “Get Dulcinea for me, alright?”

Babieca firmly stood his ground. So this was about hurting his friends? If these losers thought they could intimidate him—

“Go on, little foaly,” urged the Scimitar with his characteristic manic evil laugh, “while you still _can_.”

The Scimitar flew out of Evil Puss’ paw and struck itself onto the sand right beside where Babieca’s hoof was just a second ago, because just then the stallion was immediately spurred into frightened action.

“HA! Good boy!” cackled the Scimitar after him, “Run, _run_ , little foaly!”

So much for the joys of being a non-talking horse.

* * *

 _The spell will wear off quickly_ , the Duchess had said, and though that shouldn’t have been so much of a good thing…it _was_ actually a good thing.

The shorter amount of time he had to _stand_ being a dog, the better.

Puss carefully risked a peek through the Treasure House doors and saw that the fifteen or so wolves he had seen earlier were now making their way out of their makeshift military courtyard thing to proceed to their assigned posts. They were scattered about the San Lorenzan plaza. He locked his gaze onto Owlberto, Artephius’ shop, so _painfully_ close to the Treasure House that it was just a hop, skip, and one transformation spell away.

_We have to get there quickly._

And quietly. He pushed open the doors of the Treasure House.

The creaking noise had everywolf suspiciously twisting their heads to his direction.

But everywolf only saw a wolf in his place.

They got back to work.

Puss released a sigh.

_No one is suspicious._

He carefully began to step down the stairs—and then went back to the Treasure House to pull out Artephius, who, like him, had also been transformed into the form of a wolf. “Whoa!” said the old mage, and Puss had to slap a paw at his forehead at the noise he made that unnecessarily attracted a couple more wolves.

“Oh, uh…h-hey there, lady, how’s it doing, huh?” Artephius ad-libbed, nervously chuckling and trying to salute. The female wolf just looked at him funny before rolling her eyes and getting back to her business.

Puss sighed in relief. Then he pulled Artephius by the paw as he led the way to Owlberto.

Anyone watching would have just assumed that they were just those two wolves on their regular shift assigned to check on the Treasure House at this moment in time. And no one was really checking on the time, so it was fairly easy for them to lie low out of everyone else’s radar.

They had just about made it to Owlberto’s doorstep, but then suddenly—

The door opened.

Puss and Artephius froze on their tracks.

_…Evil Puss and the Scimitar?_

The fact that those two were even inside Owlberto in the first place should have raised several red flags in Puss’ head— _What reason did they have to go here?—_ but he was too baffled by this unexpected turn of events to speak.  

The two parties continued to stare at each other in shock.

Eventually, it was the Scimitar who broke the ice. “What are _you_ doing here?”

Fortunately, Puss had a long history as a master thief before he ever ended up here in San Lorenzo. And that came with the ability to quickly cook up a lie under spell, peer, and time pressure. “It—it was the Alpha,” Puss answered, and to hear his voice growl deep like a wolf’s reminded him that _no, Evil Puss could not see us, after all_. _No reason to panic_. “They wanted us to—“

“—to clean the shop, he said!” cut in Artephius, his voice still distinctly as high-pitched and jolly as Artephius’ despite being in wolf form. Puss had to clench his paws at his side and let his claws dig into his palms to restrain himself from palming his face in front of his supposed bosses.

Evil Puss narrowed his eyes at them for a moment in a show of intimidation. Puss held his ground and stared right back, unafraid.

(Hoping his evil counterpart would not hear his knees knocking.)

Eventually, Evil Puss shrugged. “Well, if he said so, then come on in.” He stepped down the porch, and then gave them the door.

“It’s all yours, boys. Come, Scimitar.”

Evil Puss flashed them another smile before shouldering past them, the Scimitar loyally floating right beside its wielder.

Puss spared them another look.

_How could he so easily let that lie pass?_

_Unless they really had wolves assigned to ‘clean’ Artephius’ shop?_

…Curious.

He shook his head. Not the time for thinking of improbable theories. Dismissing the thought quickly, he urged Artephius to enter Owlberto already before the effect of the transformation spell wore off.

He did, however, suddenly have a bad feeling that this was far from over.

* * *

“He is such an idiot.”

Evil Puss burst out laughing at the Scimitar’s too-true comment. “I know! I mean, _look_ at him.” He gestured at Owlberto with one paw before falling back comfortably on his seat on the rooftop’s edge. “So full of hope, so full of _himself_. I can’t wait to crush it all and watch him fall to his despair.”

If the Scimitar had eyes…well, the point was he didn’t, so he merely expressed his incredulity with a chuckle. “Letting Puss in Boots revel, thinking he’s two steps ahead…not knowing that you are just right behind him this whole time. It’s bloody _brilliant_ , absolutely spiffing. I’ve never had this much fun with any of my past handlers. You are one manipulative demon, you.”

Evil Puss heaved out a self-satisfied sigh. “Aren’t I.” It wasn’t a question, not really. He leaned back on his elbows and arched his neck so that he faced the night sky. Normally, it would have been a shade of dark navy blue, but ever since he had arrived, the stars’ backdrop had morphed into a bloody tint of black. He liked it this way so much better. “I am a genius; I must give myself that credit. Invading their minds had been such a refreshing experience.”

**_“…Isn’t it?”_ **

A shot of pain.

**_“Oh, your very existence is_ such _a beautiful irony.”_**

He looked to the side to see if Scimitar heard it too.

No. He didn’t.

He dug his fingers inside his hat so he could clutch at the fur on his head.

…it meant that he was the only one hearing this.

**_“You keep forgetting our bargain, Evil Puss.”_ **

This again.

“What. Do. You. Want?”

 ** _“Oh, nothing.”_** The Voice sounded incredibly merry. **_“This is just a little reminder of who_ really _has the upper-hand here. I can’t have you thinking for a moment that you’re actually the one in control here, now…can I?_ ”**

Evil Puss can never be sure what this feeling was and he’d never really want to _know_ , but as his paws moved to clutch his stomach, he realized that…this, this pain, it felt like _hands_ were rummaging in the drawer of his guts, twirling his internal organs in a finger, playing with them like they were _food_.

It made him feel sick.

 ** _“…The only reason you've managed control over the chessboard is that I’ve granted you the power to do with my sorcery as you wish,”_** the Voice said casually. _**“Do we understand each other?”**_

He didn’t answer. He couldn’t answer.

His guts tightened.

He thought he heard a _slush_ sound from inside his belly, almost as if his liver danced and collided with his stomach.

He wanted to hurl.

**_“I asked you. Do we understand each other?”_ **

“Yes already!” he managed to hiss out of his teeth, “ _Yes!_ ”

When he opened his eyes, the pain was no longer there. He found himself lying on his back. His back on the cold, rough bricks of the rooftop. Exhausted. His eyes on the stars.

_So far out of reach…_

**_“And why should I believe your lies?”_ **

“I’ve already sent my wolves,” he panted, both his eyes wide and traumatized, “th-they’re on their way. They will free you. Just…”

_Calm down._

_Calm down._

_Calm down._

_Calm…_

“Just wait a little longer,” he whispered. “And we’ll both get what we want. My revenge. And your freedom.”

_…down._

There was a pause.

 ** _“I've waited for a_ year _, little cat,”_** the Voice eventually growled out _, **“You better make it worth it."**_

Evil Puss tried not to think about how a _literal weight_ seemed to leave his internal organs after the Voice made its exit.

The Voice had given him everything he’d ever asked for.

But he did not like that guy.

“Ugh, _that_ guy again, huh?” The Scimitar floated into his view, each haughty word making his jewel-encrusted blade glow a bright, radiant red. “I wonder, though. How does it _feel_ like, being controlled by two evil beings?”

Evil Puss ignored the question and merely reached out to grab the Scimitar’s hilt. The Scimitar helped him up to his feet.

“I mean, really!” the sword continued to babble when Evil Puss didn’t take the bait, “Why would _anyone_ want to be freed? Freedom is so overrated. Wouldn’t it be better if everyone was under control? No one would have to face making a decision anymore. No one would ever have to be blamed again.”

Evil Puss reached the edge of the rooftop. He held out a paw.

The Scimitar sighed, flew by his wielder’s side, and waited for Evil Puss to grab at his hilt before he gracefully flew him down. The enchanted sword continued to talk as they descended.

“If you were being controlled by a higher power, there’s no guilt, because you didn’t have the responsibility of choice in the first place. If you had no choice but to _obey_ …you wouldn’t think about how to control anything. You just leave it to your omniscient controller. All you have to do is sit back, relax, and let the show unfold.”

Eventually, Evil Puss’ boots made a touchdown to the cobblestone floor, and he began walking.

“You’re one to talk,” grumbled Evil Puss as he proceeded to the Mayor’s office, his entire body still incredibly sore from the latest torture. “You are a control freak.”

“Well, what _else_ could I do? I was _enchanted_ to control! It’s my life’s purpose! I can’t turn my back on that, can I?” The Scimitar waited for Evil Puss to retort at that, for him to say something, _anything_ , but he only ended up ignoring that bait again. The sword let out a long-suffering sigh. Usually, they enjoyed spending their time sparring verbally, just to see if they can make the other cry or beg or plead surrender. That was actually another aspect of Evil Puss that Scimitar liked about him so much—he was actually intellectually _stimulating_.

His previous wielders? Oh, they were nothing but bumbling _idiots_. Idiots, all of them! The Triffith wasn’t that bad, but El Moco, oh, he was _bad_. The Scimitar could swear that large as the oaf was, he had a brain smaller than a flea’s.

Evil Puss was different.

He was _evil_.

Real, actual evil—with purpose, and insanity, and a little bit of humanity.

His evil had roots. Direction.

And that was what made his every evil deed so _delicious_.

Evil Puss would often insist that the notion of ‘evil’ was childish, that something that sounded like…‘amoral’ was more appropriate for men of their ways.

Either way, both of them agreed that _evil_ sounded more intimidating, more tasteful, than _amoral_.

Evil _and_ style. Qualities that the Scimitar looked for in a villain. These were the reasons why Evil Puss’ paw fit his hilt so perfectly.

“You know what,” the sword blurted out of the blue.

“What.”

“The three of us should really stop controlling each other and make a team—”

“ _No_.”

“No? But we would be _maleficent!_ You, me, that voice in your head…just _think_ of the possibilities!”

Evil Puss groaned. “I don’t want to hear this….”

“Actually, I already have an idea for a team name.”

“You are incapable of mercy.”

“ _The Three Diablos!_ Perfect, is it not?”

“If you don’t _stop_ _it_ ,” said Evil Puss, slamming open the Mayor’s office, “I'll throw you to the depths of the Netherworld.”

The Scimitar followed the cat right inside the cosy office. “You… _do_ realize I'm a magic sword that can fly on my own.”

The cat shrugged. “Then I will secure you with an anchor.”

“Ooh,” intoned the Scimitar, “ _Scary._ ”

* * *

They transformed back to their original selves the moment Puss closed the door.

“Erm…what kind of spell would you like me to do for you again, Puss?”

Puss walked with purpose towards the shop’s desk, looking over Artephius’ scattered books and burned papers and disorganized bottles of potion, all the while being careful not to step over his macramé owls with his dusty boots. He let his mouth run as he searched for the scroll he needed to find for this.

The scroll that Sino had instructed him to find from his recent vision.

“Evil Puss said something about having recreated the mercuric chalk with the help of an unwilling sorcerer,” he began, remembering _that_ conversation with his evil self that seemed from so long ago when in fact, only less than a day has gone by since their arrival from the Netherworld. “This…mercuric chalk. It had transferred him ten years into the future of his own homeworld, and returned again to _this_ world…ten years _back_. The mercuric chalk had enabled him to travel not only between worlds, but also through the fourth dimension. Time.” When he did not find what he was looking for, Puss pulled his head out from under the desk and pounded a fist onto the wooden surface to seize Artephius’ attention. “Now, what I am saying here is…perhaps it is possible for you to create a mercuric chalk that can send _me_ to the past year, while being in this same version of San Lorenzo.”

Artephius merely blinked at him in shock.

“I…what?”

Puss did not let his gaze waver. “You heard me.”

“But…Puss, that’s silly!” The old alchemist chuckled nervously and lifted his right hand to uncomfortably scratch up his left arm. “Ah—I mean…everyone knows that _magic_ is the fourth dimension, time is just a—“

“Answer my question,” Puss cut off. When he realized he’d sounded a lot ruder than he intended, he amended with a gentler, “Please.”

But Artephius just stood there, still uncertain. “You want me to…send you back in time, that’s what you’re saying?”

“Exactly,” said Puss, smiling, and then returned to looking for whatever it was he was supposed to be looking for. _Sino had told me that I would know._ “Is it possible?”

Artephius cleared his throat. “I…actually already hid one extra mercuric chalk here, remember the time we sent all those thirty-eight Pusses back to their own worlds?”

Puss had climbed up a shelf and was examining a potion’s label when he suddenly smirked down at Artephius as soon as that comment slipped by the old mage’s thick white beard. “I knew it. You do not purposefully forget our adventures after all.”

The alchemist had just been rummaging through his drawer of clothes when he looked up at his feline companion, now genuinely confused. “Huh? Say what?”

Puss rolled his eyes. “Never mind.”

“Anyway,” said Artephius, picking up the last extra mercuric chalk he’d hidden in his underwear drawer, (Puss did not want to ask), “I guess I could melt the chalk again and add or subtract ingredients by proportion so that we could design it the way we want to…but for that, I’m still going to have to find my scroll. It may take hours, even _days_ before we can begin our—”

Puss pulled out the scroll hidden from the corner of the highest shelf and hooted his triumph. “Ha! None can hide from Puss, in Boots, when I am on your trail, scroll!”

Artephius looked at him funny. “Er….”

Puss climbed down from his perch and smugly offered him what he found.

“Might _this_ be the scroll you were just speaking of?”

Artephius hesitated for a moment before reaching out to take it. He proceeded to his desk to spread out the yellowed, old, crinkly scroll with both hands, but even as he did so…his eyes remained locked on Puss in Boots with suspicion. “That’s…kinda weird. How would you know it was this? How did you know it would be _there?_ ”

The cat thought for a moment whether or not it would be wise to tell him, and then ultimately deciding that there would be no harm in either.

“I…well. I have been told by the Great Mage Sino himself, from a vision.”

Artephius took a horrified step back and gasped.

“You’ve gone _crazy_ , Puss! Remember that one time when Sino showed up to us and we all thought it was for real, but he ended up turning out to be a _fake?_ ”

“Of course I remember,” Puss retaliated, offended that a crazy man would accuse _him_ of being crazy. “How could I—”

“So why would you trust a Sino—from a _dream?_ ”

Okay. He regretted telling him. “It is not a dream, Artephius, it is a _vision!_ ”

“I!” Artephius had raised a finger, ready to lash back with an argument, but then he looked like he forgot what he was about to say in the middle of that sentence. “…what were we fighting about again?”

He shook his head. “ _Artephius_. I really need you to focus. Create a spell for me that will send me back in time. Can you do it as quickly as possible?”

“Well…let’s see.” Artephius began to carefully inspect the script with narrowed eyes. Then he drew back, aforementioned eyes going wide. “Weird…that’s kind of…the modern script! I mean, who writes _spells_ in the modern script? I must be getting old…”

_“Artephius.”_

“Alright, alright,” said Artephius, shrugging, “the procedure looks easy enough. No need to translate, I guess I can work with this. But that’s what makes it so, I dunno, suspicious.”

Puss stopped. _“_ Suspicious? _”_

The alchemist looked at him. “Because easy magicks are usually of the dark arts.”

“ _Dark_ arts?” _But why would Sino…_

Something fluttered at the surface of his memory.

Something… _someone_.

_“Of the visions, you must beware._

_“At a time like this…the Tiny Queen senses that mind sorcerers are about._

_“Do not listen to whatever he says._

_“Do not—”_

—he stomped those thoughts until they faded into nothing. 

This was no time for reminiscence.

“Argh.” Artephius knocked his knuckles against the scroll once before frustratedly slumping back into his chair. “I don’t know, I can’t always be sure. It’s just that…this one just feels…different. And this spell. It _seems_ right, but…the ingredients.” He leaned forward to the scroll again. “They are, I dunno, oddly phrased? As if whoever wrote this is trying so hard to hide the true nature of the spell. It says something about an eye. I mean…look at it!” He pointed at what seemed like a word onto the scroll as if expecting Puss to be able to read anything written in spellcasting runes. “An _eye!_ Blegh. It’s clearly dark!”

More uncertainty thrown into the mix. Fantastic. Puss rubbed his forehead with his fingers as if that would quell down a rising headache. It did not.

“So.” He put the side of his paw on the palm of his other paw in a slicing motion. “If you would let me get this straight. In…order to accomplish this spell, you would actually need someone else’s… _eye?_ ”

Even Puss could not be certain if he can sacrifice even his own eye for this spell, because how can he ever pick up the sword again without depth perception?

But, if it’s for San Lorenzo, then…then he thought…

“No, no Puss,” Artephius said, and Puss realized that he would not have noticed his own paw subconsciously reaching for his left eye hadn’t his old friend’s bony hand reached out to stop it. “I don’t mean a literal eye, buddy, don’t worry. I mean an _eye_. A magical entrapment item! Are you familiar with the Eye of Horus, for example? Ooh, I went to Egypt once, and then I—”

“Artephius,” Puss breathed out, slumping onto the floor, then looking up at him with exhausted eyes. “You are _stalling_.”

Artephius opened his mouth and appeared to be about to defend himself, but ultimately he closed it again.

“…I don’t _know_ , Puss. You want me to turn back time…it’s time-manipulation magic we’re talking about here. This scroll looks suspicious…and the spell looks _easy_.”

“Este…what? You have a problem with the spell because it is…easy?” Puss had no idea he could even be more lost now than before. “And how is that such a terrible thing?”

Disbelief painted Artephius’ face as soon as those words escaped the cat’s mouth. “Uh, Puss? Are you out of your nut? _Yes!_ It’s a _terrible_ thing! This spell,” he said, pointing his chin towards the scroll on his desk, “looks too easy for distorting something as big as time! Like, it’s so easy in fact,” he grabbed a broom in a cobwebbed corner and began to sweep his workplace, “I could finish it in five minutes!” He stepped onto the broom’s healthy bundle of twigs and straws and fell to the ground on his back in five seconds flat after making a sweeping motion of it.

“Or a year.”

Puss groaned at his companion’s clumsiness but did not hesitate to help him up. “You continue to confuse me, my friend, but let me rephrase my question. Is it not better for us if the spell is simple?”

“Ach, no, Puss, I—“ Artephius put a palm over his eyes and shook his head, obviously having trouble figuring out how to break it to him. He tried again. “People…they wish to go back in time _all_ the time. They want to fix their mistakes to ultimately undo everything they’ve ever done. So my _point_ is, if time-manipulation magic were _this_ easy, _everybody_ would do it _every_ time they make a mistake.”

“Right. The better if it is simple, then, come _on_ , Artephius!”

“I—but I just can’t send you back to undo it all, Puss. Aren’t you aware that that might cause countless repercussions that you _might_ not like? And once you do it…ironically, there’ll be no turning back!”

Puss actually paused to consider this. “What repercussions?”

“For example, well.” Artephius picked up stacks of papers and books from his worktable and put them to the ground to get his area ready. His shop was a mess, but that did not mean he had to have a messy workplace if he was going to conduct this spell. “If you cause something, _anything_ , no matter how small, to happen differently in the past than as they originally had, it will definitely have an impact in the future. Did you know that the smallest stutter in the flutter of a butterfly wing from somewhere thousands of miles away could cause a large storm in someplace else?”

“I am aware of the risks of this,” Puss said matter-of-factly. “Changing the past is what I plan to do after all.”

“Ah, and also, there’ll be two of you in one timeline.”

“Okay. So…?” Puss prompted, not quite comprehending what Artephius was trying to say. “Two of me existing in one universe is so bad because…?”

“ _Because_ ,” stressed Artephius, grabbing his broom once again to sweep the dirt out from underneath his desk, “two of the _exact_ same thing in one universe _is_ an unnatural thing. Of course, nature does everything in its power to eliminate all things unnatural. What do you think it does to achieve that?”

“Perhaps nature will…merge me with my original body so that there will only be one of myself in one universe?”

It was just a guess, but he hadn’t expected to make Artephius pause and think of the real possibilities of that.

“Well, I haven’t thought of that, but merging with yourself? That is actually possible. No one’s ever had the chance to write down what happens when they go back in time.”

Puss gave himself a little hope. “…because nothing terrible happens, right?”

“Maybe. But,” Artephius said, “there _are_ some magical theories saying that in order for nature to put the balance back into the universe, it destroys the time-traveller.”

“Destroys.” Puss thought that that was a bit melodramatic. “What do you mean _destroys?_ ”

“Slowly.” Artephius looked at him. “One corpuscle at a time.”

“I…” A pang of fear. “I don’t follow.”

“Puss,” Artephius said, putting every bottle of potion he could find on his shelf and in every other corner of his shop onto his table for examination, “every element is unique in the universe. And when they meet an exact copy of their own, they eliminate themselves. To bring back the balance. I—you don’t have to understand how it works,” he added, seeing the conflict on Puss’ face, “so don’t worry, Puss. After all, this is all just conjecture. As I said, no one’s ever really—”

Puss breathed heavily.

“Then I will risk it.”

_(Are you willing to hold the thorns?)_

Artephius’ eyes widened. “…What?”

“I am willing to take the risks, Artephius. You say nature destroys time travellers? Well. If it means I can fix everything from where this all began, then I say…let us do this.” Puss smiled and shrugged his shoulders casually.

Artephius stared at him.

“You mean…do you really want to restart everything? From the very beginning?”

“Of course not,” said Puss. “I want you to send me back to the day before the first of May.”

That immediately sparked a memory. The alchemist gasped. “The day of the Walpurgisnacht! But…but why… _ahhh_.” Clarity descended over Artephius’ eyes. “I get it!”

Puss’ smile turned to a smirk. “Yes. I am glad that you do.” Then he returned to his sombre mood. “It is the day when all the truly irreversible things began. Uli had tricked us that the Crown of Souls is the key to restoring San Lorenzo’s protective spell, when in truth, it is merely a tool to summon the Bloodwolf, further endangering the town when all we had wanted was to restore the town’s protective spell.” He swallowed thickly. “The Crown of Souls…I must find a way to stop Dulcinea of the past from wearing the Crown by the time I get there. If I succeed in doing so, I will have prevented opening the portal to the Netherworld, prevented our world and the Netherworld from being thrown out of balance. I will have prevented all the bad things that happened after from ever happening again.”

Artephius had a smile on his face. “Why aren’t you considering going all the way back into the past, before you ever met us? Before you, you know…shattered the town’s protection spell?”

Puss looked at him.

Artephius shook his hands in the air, his eyes wide. “I’m not saying that I don’t like your plan! I’m just saying it surprises me, is all. I thought you were guilty about this whole thing because of, you know, what you did in the beginning.”

Puss shrugged.

“Well. Perhaps it is because I recognize now that meeting all of you had not been all that bad.” _Who was he fooling?_ “I want to maximize all the good I have done for San Lorenzo from the moment I have shattered the spell of protection. I have given Sphinx a home. Same for Cleevil. Again for the Duchess. I cannot undo all that. I wish only to undo the opening of the portal.”

Artephius began laughing. “Oh, phooey, this is—this could actually work! You could actually save everyone else from the wrath of the Blind King!”

Then, he stopped. Horror descended onto his eyes.

“But—but no,” stammered the old mage, “You’re my friend, Puss. I can't have you get lost back to the past, it's too dangerous, I—”

“Danger? Artephius, my friend, I _flirt_ with danger.” Puss brandished a smug smirk. “All the more reason for me to venture into it, do you think not?”

Helplessness. His arms fell limply to his sides. “I…There isn’t any other way to fix this, huh?”

That fluttering _memory_ —why did it keep coming back to the surface of his mind? Another way to fix this—no, no, _this_ was the only way. Nothing else.

“…I am afraid so.”

Artephius glanced up at him from whatever he was writing on the margin of the scroll.

“Alrighty, then. Let’s do this.”

* * *

(But do not say you were never warned.)


	14. A Second Prophecy

_During the past year, I have kept the spirit of San Lorenzo caged._

_The first days weren’t easy, of course. I didn’t expect it not to be. After all, where’s the fun in toying with a captured bird if it never once flailed its tiny wings in a desperate scramble for the pure and precious release of freedom it so madly desired?_

_Its flickering emotions, its scintillating dreams, the teetering glass of its fragile hopes, the frantic beating of its weak little heart…_

_The fun lied in_ those _._

_And inscribed herein is my prime method of achieving the most pleasure from their pain._

_The first step is to capture it, ensnare it, let it writhe against the bounds. Exhaust it, play with it, make it think you were going to let it go if it behaved like a nice little birdy._

_Then free it._

_Yes, free the little bird, manipulate it into feeling false hope, lull it into a false sense of security—let it soar, let it laugh, let it conquer the sky for a minute or so—before yanking on the invisible chain you’ve fastened on its tiny foot to drag it back down to the ground where its fragile body splatters out its hopes and dreams in a miserable mess of a masterpiece._

That _is how you have fun._

 _The first few months, I locked them in their cages. Let them rant, let them cry, let them beg for their freedom. I did not bat an eye. If they want food, I let them out and they work for me. Clean my office. Kiss my boot. Keep me entertained by pretending on suffocating themselves in a drama play—even better, make it real! Melt the mystical gold, have it heated, mould it into my throne, embed all your tears and drops of blood and rubies and diamonds into its glorious peacock backrest, glorify me as your one true lord. Get the stupid Sino statue off its mighty pedestal, for I, your God, your Ruler, your Dictator, your Emperor-King, shall now seize his place. Create my military fortress; demolish the garden behind the stupid shoe orphanage, stomp it to ground! Fine—keep a square yard so you can cultivate your precious potatoes and pickles, but take responsibility for them; just know that I’ve warned you if I accidentally stepped on your tender little seedlings. I will never touch your disgusting vegetables—I’d rather eat the fish from the rich market of Andalusia and leave you starving and oh, do you_ want _one? No? NO? Ha! So I see you STILL have your PRIDE! Impressive! Starve yourselves by eating limp cabbages and thin slices of fried potatoes for the rest of your pitiful dirty meaningless nasty brutish painfully short lives why don’t you huh because i don’t care hA HA HA HA!_

_Oh, and the earthquakes. Right. For a long time, I’ve had the suspicion that Puss in Boots and his meddling companions have ganged up with the Tiny Queen to play these ridiculous end-of-the-world tricks on me to drive me out of this lousy town. Bah. If they think such a small and petty threat would stop me from getting what I want, then they are severely mistaken._

_And even if these earthquakes weren’t them pranking me, eh, at least I have my own way out of this hellhole if things hit the fan._

_The San Lorenzans, they wouldn’t have to worry about being buried in the aftermath of the apocalypse. At least they won’t die alone like I almost did when I was humiliated by my empire._

_Caged in that precious little Treasure House of theirs, they shall die together._

_And could anything be more beautiful than_ that? _It’s exquisite, don’t you say, just EXQUISITE!_

_Ah, what a life. I’ve always been called strange for having such a perverted nature of experiencing pleasure—in fact, the Scimitar is probably the first to recognize this as a trait rather than a defect, which is probably one of the reasons why he and I had become such chummy confidants the moment we met—but how can the rest of the world understand? It’s not like I chose to be the way I am._

_Who I am is engraved in stone. Destined. I am_ fated _to be evil._

_I have read countless accounts of them. Accounts of an ancient prophecy._

_The Ancient Prophecy._

_I had free time—lots of it—and I spent the better part of it educating myself. My brief stay in the Netherworld had given me access to the vast, ancient library of the Zephilim scholars; and my past year here had been spent in that alchemist’s owl shop, apparently the only place in the entire town that housed something even remotely readable. (The Orphanage’s classroom was full of stupid children’s books and I elected to have them all burnt to the ground.) I found the alchemist’s books on alchemy, sorcery, and divination magic quite…appealing, which is most probably why I vented the least of my destructive flares of anger on that senile fool’s avian-like dwelling._

_Most intriguing was his possession of a thousand-page book that foretold of a doomed future._

_Apparently, it’s something different from the Great Prophecy, in which a mighty beast, an Ancient Evil, shall claw its way out of hell to throw the world into fear and chaos unless stopped by the One._

_No…this one is apparently_ bigger _than that. What is amazing is that it coincides with what I have read of Netherworldian Zephilim literature._

_Both scriptures foretell of an Evil One._

_They describe the Evil One as a fallen, godly might, come to return to drown the world in fire._

_And I knew, as I read through the scripture I KNEW, that this Evil One HAD to be me._

_It HAD to._

_The descriptions FIT me like a newly bought pair of BOOTS._

_Where many would react in the most rebellious way once introduced to their fate, I felt so, so free._

_The moment I found out that_ **I** _am actually the Evil One of the Ancient Prophecy, I felt so LIBERATED._

_Because finally, finally, I know the reason why I have always been like this._

_I know the reason why I am evil._

_The responsibility, the burden to change, has been lifted from my shoulders._

_I don’t have to change._

_I can remain evil all my life._

_Because if it’s written already by Fate itself that I’ve ALWAYS been SUPPOSED to be EVIL, then what is the POINT of REBELLING against it, am I right?_

_Am I rIGHT?_

* * *

 

Onward they marched, the blue light of their torches creating shadows that lurked in the corners and haunted their paths like spectres.

The soft bed of soil and its occasional patches of grass and fallen amber leaves became stone as their journey gradually progressed. The stone was hard and grey and drained of life, cold and oppressive beneath the tender pads of their paws. The once dense canopy of leaves spread over the sky had long thinned significantly to give their journey more natural luminance. Rather than the comfort of the celestial nightlight, however, the bleeding sky did nothing but bring upon them the chill of an omen. A storm seemed to loom ahead. The ringing noise of insect life had already vanished from far back in the path they’ve left behind, and even the hawks and the ravens and the owls could only stare as their army passed them by. They seemed to implore with their wide, black beads of eyes to _go_ , back away while you can, do _not_ dare enter this chartless area of the land—this forbidden territory that reeked of death!

Thousands of screeching bats emerged from a wall of shadows and went blazing past their ranks of wolves, their flapping wings stirring the dead air and their claws scratching against skin. The wolves went wild despite the Alpha’s command to _calm down, you brainless idiots, look at them, they’re not even attacking us, they’re just—they’re JUST—_

The flock thinned and the bats disappeared into the darkness behind, leaving the wolves a heaping pile of sweat-stained fur and breathless bodies on the ground, their—stolen—magical torches scattered amongst them.

As the wolves struggled to get back to their feet, however, they caught sight of one remaining bat.

It stared at them. Intently. There was something akin to…fear? terror? the panic of a warning? …etched onto its features. But before the Alpha could figure out what it was _trying_ to communicate, the small winged mammal promptly flitted away, a tremble noticeable on its shaky flight.

He brushed it off and barked at his comrades to get back up and march—he was eager to get this job done.

_B-Boss? Do you think that meant anything?_

No, surely it was just a bunch of bats frightened by a noise or something.

_But what if that half-pint was trying to tell us something?_

No, I said it was just a bunch of frightened bats.

_What if it wasn’t?_

_What if there really is danger?_

_What if there’s something out there that we aren’t prepared to face?_

No, Master wouldn’t send us here if it’d harm us. 

No, I’m sure this is the right place.

No, we are _not_ turning back.

No.

No.

No.

But it could only be for so long until he finally exploded.

“GET A HOLD OF YOURSELVES, YOU _FEMALES!_ ”

It was only after he said that that the pack went quiet.

He really hadn’t wanted to go that far. But if insulting their delicate masculine pride was the only way to shut them up, well.

It wasn’t that he didn’t get how they felt. As a matter of fact, he was the one who understood their plight the most. The anxiety they felt, he felt it too. It was thick in the air, like a black fog or a miasma, and once inhaled, it made his chest feel so tight. Was that the reason behind the tension in his muscles, why he was holding his breath? This kind of fear was unfounded. There wasn’t even any imminent danger, but his heart, it was pounding so fast, so fast, as if his instincts…

His primal instincts…

They were telling him to turn back now.

 _But no_ , he thought. This was their mission, their sole mission. Their Master had commanded, and so they shall deliver.

So they shall deliver.

They would not know what to do with themselves otherwise.

As they continued to march up the stone cliff, the still air became zephyrs, cold and screaming and unrelenting. The path carved into the stone spiralled upward the nature-made tower, its peak disappearing into the sky as it pierced the swirling cloud of nimbus atop it. They walked along the predesigned path, up, up, up the cliff and following blindly after each other, their collective silence letting their thoughts of dread and apprehension go loose and wild to nearly drive them out of their minds.

“’Ey!” called someone from far behind. Sarge. Earlier, Sarge had moved to the rear of the pack, _to make sure no one fell behind_. His exact words, spoken so coolly it would’ve fooled anyone who didn’t know him better—a veil of superior nonchalance to hide his true concern for his pack brothers. “Everyone, I think we’re here. Look!”

He pointed and everyone turned their heads up to follow the direction his finger was pointing at, only to have the sky flash and bang before they finally caught sight of it.

A Red Sheevra.

Her skin—that was the first striking thing, because it had the disturbingly familiar shade of mammalian blood. Her eyes were huge and bulged out her head, which seemed to be proportionally larger than the rest of her body. Her legs were crossed underneath her. A pair of fairy wings fluttered from her back, holding her small, demon-like form aloft. She stayed still, at a perfect lotus position to look over her vast territory, stationed to guard the gates of the prison tower.

Of the Forbidden Citadel.

They had arrived.

And she was staring at them, a toothy grin spread eerily over her leathery black lips.

* * *

The Scimitar was not a sidekick. He was a magical artefact destined to be carried by all who are worthy to snaffle the holy title of Evilness. He was the Bringer of the Wicked, the Maker of the Malevolent—he was a gallant servant of Evil who shall, in the near looming future, bring the Lady Darkness to her rightful throne.

Of course, in order to achieve that, he was to fulfil the little things first. As an evil sword cursed by an ancient enchantress to spread his evilness, he _lives_ off of evil deeds—he siphons the delicious red energy off from blackened hearts, lets the power accumulate within his magical core, and finally unleashes it in the beautiful sin that he’d so devilishly, _lavishly_ inspire his wielder to commit.

The good thing was he didn’t _need_ to put effort in controlling Evil Puss. He was already evil by the time they’d shook upon a mutual agreement of partnership. The Scimitar, he was fully informed of his wielder’s entire diabolical scheme. Well…not exactly ‘fully’ informed, as the sword didn’t like to bother with the little bits and pieces and his wielder could get a little _feisty_ whenever prodded for the more convoluted matters (such as his true, underlying motives for even wanting to go around in circles for this circus.) But he had the gist of it. The gist. And that, he thought, was what truly mattered.

Evil Puss intends to execute his revenge in the most fashionable way possible to ultimately fulfil his role in the grand scheme of things—every minute detail had been given considerable attention, every contingency designed with a painstaking plan.

Granted, he had to form this plan at the last second because the original one failed. Tch. The only reason those pesky lovecats—plus their silly little horse—managed to escape during their lousy attempt at a ‘rebellion’ was that they got lucky. They got _lucky_ , nothing more than that.

And it will not happen again.

The enchanted evil sword thought that this Plan B was…unnecessarily convoluted, though. The original plan had been a simple A) capture Puss, B) involve Dulcinea because Evil Puss really _is_ that much of a sadistic jerk, and C) cast a dark spell of entrapment over Puss in Boots to curse him for life. See? All they had to do was connect A to B, then B to C. Easy-peasy, lemon squeezy. Though the Scimitar was not really a big fan of acting out sadistic impulses (he preferred messy, bloody brutality, not this slow, drawn-out psychological torture), he thought that that was already quite the passable plan for a successful revenge.

The entrapment spell—oh, that was his favourite part! It was a suggestion that came from the Voice, and the spell required making the victim drink a potion before its detrimental effects took over. Evil Puss loved it so much that he persuaded the Voice to teach him how to brew it. He’d long had the potion finished, months ago actually. Despite requiring a lot of ingredients, a lot of witchy chanting, and a lot of trial and error from Wiccan mispronunciation (really, why the mages had to perform these spells under an ancient tongue no one even bothered to use anymore, the Scimitar would never know), the potion for the entrapment spell was actually fairly quickly made.

That entire plan got dashed though, when Puss and Dulcinea made their escape from the Blind King’s evil clutches. He’d been so livid. So livid, in fact, that he managed to magnificently plot a Plan B for revenge in five minutes flat. When the Scimitar caught wind of it, he thought it was so sadistic that even a creature of inherent evil such as himself was left wondering _why_.

Why is it, really, that he had to go through all of this?

Plan B was a convoluted mess. The base outline of the original plan was still there—get Puss, involve Dulcinea, and cast the curse on Bootsie as the grand finale act—but even the Scimitar was unable to keep track of Evil Puss’ full machinations at work. All he understood was that he’d finally put those nifty little mind tricks of his to actual purpose, deliberately tricking Puss and Dulcinea into acting however he wanted them to act. Actually, he never bothered to know the true details. All that mattered to the sword was that the method was dirty and foul and he _loved_ to bits the way his wielder’s perverted mind worked.

The enchanted sword floated pensively before a row of old, dusty portraits hung across the wall of the ex-town mayor’s musty office, staring at the meticulously detailed paintings without really looking at them. He grunted to himself eventually.

Evil Puss was the king of the entire chessboard and everyone else was his pawn.

Everyone.

But sometimes, he just couldn’t help but wonder about…something.

“Puss…in…Boots.”

The Scimitar slowly drawled the words out of his…well, whatever he had as a substitute for a mouth, breaking the still silence of the town’s ex-mayor’s office. He was testing how the solid syllables of that name and title brushed across the edge of his ruby-encrusted blade.

The sword turned on his hilt and floated across the office to approach his wielder. His feline collaborator and partner-in-crime meditatively sat cross-armed and cross-legged on top of the ex-mayor’s mahogany desk, his eyes closed and his form still. The disturbed frown on Evil Puss’ face, however, betrayed the calm that he was apparently trying to exhibit.

Like he’s trying to prove that he’s unaffected.

Sight, the Scimitar had long learned, was not only experienced through functional eyes.

The sword sighed exasperatedly.

A whisker twitching, his back stiffening, and apparently chafed by the slight, unwelcome noise, Evil Puss cracked open an eye from his meditation and regarded the Scimitar, silently, hatefully, glaringly shooting back at him one single word like a poisoned dagger.

_What?_

The Scimitar was unruffled, very healthily immune to the glares, thank you very much. “You heard me. Puss in Boots.”

Evil Puss closed his eye, already disinterested. “What about him?”

“I’m not talking about him.”

Evil Puss opened both his eyes this time, giving his evil sword the full effects of a death glare. The Scimitar inwardly harrumphed. The sword and the wielder’s prides clashed for a moment longer, until Evil Puss finally bristled, thoroughly annoyed that he hadn’t been able to squeeze out another word from the sword through only his glare.

Sighing and giving in, “I’ll bite. Who _else_ might you be talking about?”

The Scimitar purposefully let pass a dramatic pause.

Then, “You.”

“… _Me?_ ” sputtered the cat, his arms broken from their cross as he jabbed a finger at his own chest and let the other one grip at the edge of the table for support. “What in the name of Felicia are you—“

The sword cut him off. “I was just _wondering_ what your real title was, back in your,” Scimitar knew this was a sore spot for his companion, so he cleared his throat before tentatively continuing, “ _original_ empire.”

Evil Puss lifted his chin, a mocking pout on his face. His voice sickly sweet and cold, “ _Really_ , Scimitar. I know the past year made the two of us good chums, but I’d never expect you to _so_ sentimentally…”

“Was your name Puss in Boots?” the Scimitar pressed.

Evil Puss made a show of bursting out in bitter laughter. “I’d rather you not associate me with the idiot twin I have roaming around _my_ empire _here_.”

“Okay, so…” The sword was already genuinely curious to begin with, but Evil Puss’ slimy ways of manoeuvring the conversation and evading his questions were adding wood to the fire.

“Do you _like_ being called Evil Puss?”

“Everyone else calls me that,” the cat huffed angrily, drumming his fingers against the table as he leaned back on his other arm. “The prophecy itself _defines_ me that. And I intend to fulfil my role. Wholly. Unhesitatingly.”

“Yes, I get that, but my _original_ question was: do you actually _like_ being called Evil Puss?”

He cut another glare to him, though his voice had noticeably dropped a dangerous octave lower. “Go on,” he threatened. “Ask me that again. I dare you.”

The Scimitar scoffed; what’s the shrimp gonna do to him, make him snivel like a baby? “I shall rephrase my question then,” he said emphatically.

“Do you _like_ being called Evil, _Puss?_ ”

Puss stiffened.

Oh, how he wished he had eyes to so gloriously roll. “Come now, you little baby, is this topic such a _sensitive_ —”

“Shut up,” commanded the cat, and he jumped down from his comfortable seat on the desk to land on his boots in a cautious squat, his eyes darting back and forth as if trying to inspect…

The Scimitar snapped out of his lazy demeanour and easily switched from it to vigilance.

“Wait, what’s going—whoa!”

Evil Puss grabbed him by the hilt and stormed out of the office.

“Another earthquake,” he hissed to him in alarm, and he dashed out to the plaza where he was met by the fifteen or so wolves that he still had with him. He needn’t prompt them for a report.

One of them stepped forward, and with urgency burning underneath his words—

“Something’s wrong in the Treasure House, sir.”

* * *

As the land calmed down from its seismic ire, the wolves got up and turned their growling faces to the small fairy, her mouth twisted into an infuriating grin as if to mock how pathetic they were to be bound to the ground.

The Alpha burned with anger. The sudden urge to kill this kid burned so strong from within him that he unsheathed his claws from his trembling paws. But that tension suddenly dissolved when he felt the brief contact of someone else’s paw on his shoulder. Before he could even comprehend what was happening, Sarge had already stepped up, his face level yet determined, and barked with a viciousness he rarely divulged.

“We DEMAND entry into this citadel.”

The Beta wolf raised an arm to signal everyone else to ready their weapons.

The Alpha got into a stance himself.

But the fairy stayed still.

He growled under his breath. This kid wasn’t taking them as a threat. She was making fun of them. She was making fun of them! How dare the little brat? Oh, she shall see. He wasn’t one for those ridiculous mole torches where you fire long-distance shots, not him, no sir—his weapons were his _fists_ , because he preferred to attack one-on-one, and if anyone dared to stand in the way of what he wanted, then they got a black eye comin’. If this battle came down to tooth and claw, if this so-called Guardian of the Forbidden Citadel hurt his brothers with whatever sorcery she had under her sleeves, then he will not hesitate to rip this demon’s entrails off that tiny little body of hers and she shall learn, oh she shall learn _not_ to mock the might of his pack—

She arched a nonchalant eyebrow at them.

“Sure, why not.”

The wolves paused. It was the first time they heard her voice, and the words came out rough and scratchy as if from millennia of disuse—serving to strengthen the aura of dark mysticism that she already held about her.

_What did she just say?_

The wolves faltered.

None were certain if they heard her right.

Because she was letting them in.

Letting them in the _Forbidden Citadel_.

Just like that.

The beta barked out a laugh. “You little runt can’t be serious—“

“Oh, but I am!” She floated aside with a hand grand gesture as if to say, ‘it’s all yours’.

“Go on right in.”

The heavy doors creaked under their own weight as they moved inward on their own accord, revealing the vast, echoing darkness from within.

“Go,” she prodded further. “You shall find what you seek at the heart of the citadel. What else might you be waiting for?”

Weapons were lowered, the blue flames on their torches flickering.

“…Is this a trick?”

“Of course it is.” She sneered, not missing a beat. “You think you are the first to venture out in these forbidden lands? HA! STUPID MORTALS! Thousands before you have already attempted what you’re trying to do. And guess _what?_ ”

None answered.

She stretched her mouth to flaunt a glinting fang.

“None survived.”

* * *

(There was a prophecy.)

(A fallen, godly might, having lain dormant for time inconceivable, would rise up from the hell where he had been cast out—and he would bring with him the mystical Phoenix’s demonfire.)

(Unless stopped, he would engulf the world in his fiery madness.)

(From reading countless mystical literature both Zephilim and of this world, his plan was spawned.)

(He shall fulfil his role as the Evil One of the Ancient Prophecy, and let nobody get in the way of what he wanted. Vengeance.)

( _Justice_.)

He burst through the doors of the Treasure House—the Scimitar refused to join him inside, saying he rather preferred it if there were less drama in his life to have fewer stress levels—and the scene that greeted him inside nearly had him toppling over his own boots.

_“IT’S TIME!”_

…a girl was screaming out her lungs.

“Cleevil, like, you’re freaking everybody out here, so like, calm down, girl!”

“It’s time! It’s time! I tell you—I keep telling you—it’s time!”

“CLEEVIL!”

“What are you talking about?!”

_“It’s time!”_

“Cleevil, speak clearly, lass.”

“Snap out of it! The earthquake’s over!”

“W-W-W-What’s happening to you, Cleevil?”

“If this is a joke, quit it! It ain’t funny, Clee!”

The goblin girl. The stupid San Lorenzans were fretting over the goblin girl—this was what his soldiers wanted him to see? He scoffed. This was likely a prank set up by the obnoxious brat. The imp had always been the one to grate his nerves the most. This had happened before, and he will not fall for it again. But just as he turned around to leave…

“It’s time, she’s telling me it’s time, and—and I don’t want to listen to it, but she keeps telling me—ugh! _WHO_ ARE _YOU?! GET OUT OF MY HEAD!_ ”

He stopped in his tracks when his ears caught that tiny bit. ‘Get out of my head’? But he wasn’t…he wasn’t controlling anyone right now. And the only dolls he had were of those two disgusting lovebirds…

Was there some other unknown variable at play here?

_“YOU!”_

…Zapata.

“You vile _demonio!_ ” She gripped on the bars of her cage so tightly he could see her pumping veins bulge out from underneath her mocha skin. Same with her eyes. She was baring her teeth at him like a beast, and he could only think of how fitting it was that he had trapped that brutish woman—if she even passed as a woman at all—in a cage _made_ for beasts. She gestured frenetically towards the goblin girl, who still kept spouting nonsense from that mouth of hers while everybody tried to calm her down.

“ _THIS_ is all YOUR FAULT! We could only go for so long until one of us breaks, and this, _this is a GIRL you have broken_ , do you see this, THIS is what you’ve done to her! Do you see this?! Do you?! Or are you that _blind?!_ ”

He sighed.

“Yes, yes, I see it.” He waved a paw dismissively. “Now if you could do everyone a favour and shut up.”

“YOU…!” Oh dear, she just refused to shut up, didn’t she? “YOU FIX THIS MESS YOU MADE, EVIL PUSS IN THE BOOTS! YOU FIX THIS! OR I—ONCE I GET OUT OF HERE, _I—!_ ”

“Señora Zapata.” He smiled complacently at her. “That is the point of the _cage_. It’s meant to keep you _in_. How can you get out of it?”

“…this is all your fault.” Her rage had turned into silent seething.

She never got tired of insisting whose fault anything was.

“ _My_ fault? Who said I _wanted_ to get sucked into the Netherworld and get involved with _your_ world?” He walked to her, step by step by excruciating step. “Tell me, Señora.” He was not afraid to stand right across her, the distance between them letting him look at her level in the eye. “Tell me. Who was it that destroyed the balance of the worlds, sucked me out of my homeworld, and opened the Netherworldian portal in the first place?”

She didn’t answer.

He simpered, then turned away. “That’s what I thought.”

“…what do you plan to do to us?” she called after him. “Are we supposed to rot here? Would that make you happy?”

The little girl—Esme—had reached for one of the woman’s hands and was clutching it with both of her tiny ones close to her chest.

He closed his eyes.

“Once the portal’s been opened, it can never be closed. There is only one cat you should blame, Señora Zapata. And it’s not ‘Evil’ Puss.” He turned and canted his head over to the side to pass them a superior glance. “I’ve been told these earthquakes are a prelude to the destruction of your world, but guess what? I don’t _care_ if you survive whatever apocalypse is about to befall you—once things go crashing down to hell, I’m out of here.”

“Then you’re right!” A new voice had joined the conversation, and he realized a moment later that it was the cow. Pajuna. “You’re right. You really _aren’t_ evil, laddie.”

He narrowed his eyes at her.

She narrowed her eyes back at him.

“You’re a _coward_.”

“…You are going to need the Great Mage Sino himself if you want your world to be saved,” he said mechanically. “Only a sorcerer as powerful as him could close the portal. He is your only chance, and your only chance is long dead.” _Or at least_ , he said inwardly to himself, _eliminated from the equation_. As long as Puss in Boots does not venture out to find him, everything shall go exactly as he’d imagined it.

“So au revoir.”

A strange silence followed after that.

He turned. He realized that the goblin girl had finally ceased her irritating screaming, but he couldn’t tell whether that or this…this eerie calm…was more preferable.

What _was_ going on with that goblin?

“Did…you say…the…Great…Mage…Sino…?”

She stood stock still, still confined within the bars of her cage, but now her voice had…something in it.

“Cleevil?” said some.

“What’s wrong?” Kid Pickles asked.

She closed her eyes.

When she opened them—

All colour got washed away by an explosion of a blinding white light.

_“CLEEVIL!”_

* * *

Silence. Wind blew. Whistled a mourning song.

Her raspy breath brought with it the scent of death.

_‘None survived.’_

The Alpha clenched his fists by his side. The lives of his brothers…

He was being forced to _gamble_ with the lives of his brothers.

Like this was a game.

Like they were someone else’s pawns.

Like they were nothing else.

 _“FORWARD!”_ the Beta roared with an emphatic sweep of his arm when it took him long seconds to draw out the command himself; his subordinate was determined to let none of the Sheevra’s words sink into the common consciousness of the pack. He ignored the look his superior gave him and marched ahead, his mouth a grim slash of determination—this was their mission, they went this far, and they were going to finish this once and for all.

“You heard what she said!” he continued to bellow. “Our prisoner’s awaitin’! Move, move, move! We don’t got time to lose! _MOVE IT!_ ”

The ranks of wolves followed the Beta into the depths of the Forbidden Citadel with a rallying cry and raised torches into the air, leaving the Alpha standing still at the rear.

Sarge gave him a smirk—a wavering smirk—and said, dashing past him with a brief pat on his shoulder, “We better get in.”

The Alpha could only watch as his youngest subordinate surged after his brothers into the darkness. He looked back. Growled at the demon fairy.

And, finally, followed his pack inside.

If one looked back, the last thing that could be seen was the malevolent grin stretching eerily on the Sheevra’s face before the doors ultimately closed and locked its doomed prisoners in for good.

A disembodied voice cackled in the darkness.

“Let’s have _fun_ , boys.”

* * *

Artephius was right. This was too easy.

 _Too_ easy.

He had expected at least even the _tiniest_ ounce of difficulty in concocting what they planned to craft. The ingredients, maybe. Artephius had commented, as he scanned the list inscribed in the scroll earlier, that the ingredients were _supposedly_ hard to find, rare materials that only came to existence on Earth once every thousand years. That excited Puss for a moment—he had, after all, a rather unhealthy penchant for danger and adventure—but that excitement was short-lived. Because, oddly enough…

They found all the ingredients set right up in the shop.

He had the vague recollection of suspecting Evil Puss and the Scimitar’s possible involvement in this, earlier when they caught the pair exiting Owlberto.

 _“It’s all yours, boys,”_ Evil Puss had said, with too complacent a smile on his face to be comforting _. “Come, Scimitar.”_

But then again, even if he was being set up, it made no sense. It made no sense now.

Why would his evil twin set him up?

 _How_ could his evil twin set him up?

How _could_ he set him up?

When Artephius dropped a bead of what he said was the liquefied silver tooth of a sea-dwelling dragon into the bubbling contents of his thaumaturgic pot, smoke erupted into a soft, blue fluff of cloud that made Puss pinch two fingers on the bridge of his nose with one paw and wave at the smoke away from his face with the other. Artephius remained unaffected; he wore a protective mask, and with the sharp scent of this potpourri of bizarre ingredients, Puss briefly wished he took Artephius’ advice and wore his protective gear as well. But that thought immediately dissolved when Puss leaned into the pot again, intrigued, when his alchemist companion retrieved a pair of tongs from his desk nearby and plucked out a piece of chalk—the mystical mercuric chalk—from the smooth, creamy surface of the pot’s contents, which had the moderately thin consistency of melted butter. 

A grin broke out of his face. This was it. He was so close. So, so _close_ to finally fixing everything. It did not matter if they were going to sing his name for eternity, did not matter if they held a party in his honour for weeks on end, did not matter if they were going to build him a statue of marble or obsidian. For the first time _he_ did not matter, because _Felina._

Soon, San Lorenzo will be free again.

“At last!” he harrumphed, snatching the chalk from Artephius’ tongs. “I have done it! Victory is at paw! Who can stop me now, eh? When I, Puss, in Boots—”

Artephius’s hands flailed after he tossed away the mask to reveal the panic in his face.

“Puss, no, wait! It’s still—“

That was also when reality burned Puss—maybe nigh literally.

“Yike!” He tossed the chalk to the floor then proceeded to squeezed his paw. The pads of his paw _throbbed_ with the violent protest against the searing heat inflicted on it. When that did not even ease the pain an iota, he blew puffs of air onto it like a child would.

“Artephius!” he eventually hissed when all his methods failed.

The mage shrugged his shoulders. “Don’t say I didn’t warn ya, buddy.”

Puss sighed. He let his paw calm down its throbbing for a moment, then let it touch the handle of his sword to test if he could fight with it. He hissed out when the touch only fired pain up his arm. Unfortunate that it had to be his right paw when his right wrist had only been recently abused. He was ambidextrous, but he fought _better_ with his right arm.

Singed by his own arrogance. What an appropriate metaphor. He thought he’d moved on from his selfishness and become a better cat.

Apparently not.

“You okay, Puss?”

“Yes, yes,” he sighed again. He seemed to be doing that a lot whenever Artephius was around. “Now,” he moved to pick up the chalk with careful fingers this time, making sure it was already ready to be touched before fully taking the mystic item into its paw. “Only if we could—“

But then an earthquake yanked the control out from underneath his feet.

The ordeal lasted for several seconds, and both he and Artephius struggled to find something to keep themselves upright, only to roll over each other when Puss tripped forward and caught Artephius in the leg, throwing the alchemist out of balance. The walls shook, books and scrolls slipped off their shelves, bottles of potions shattered to the ground, hot droplets of white liquid spilled from their thaumaturgic pot.

They could hear the land roar.

When it finally stopped, Puss growled as he pushed himself off of Artephius and got back to his feet. He retrieved his hat from the space under Artephius’ underwear drawer, dusted it off with one sweep of a paw, then put it back on his head. Dusting the dirt off his supposedly immaculate ginger fur next, he griped.

“What _is_ it with the earthquakes, really? They have lost their sense of danger and are now nothing short of annoying!”

It was a rhetorical question, really. He did not expect an answer, which was why it surprised him when Artephius spoke up with a response that was not at least half senile.

“Well, there _is_ a theory.” He got up on his feet as well, and he patted at his sky blue robe as he spoke. “The end days are coming Puss, and it all began when the portal to the Netherworld was opened by summoning the Bloodwolf. The earthquakes are because our world and the Netherworld are soon to collide with each other.” He stood back and grandly gestured with two hands as he added, obviously following after the Duchess’ flair for the dramatic. “Just as the second prophecy had foretold!”

He had dealt with enough prophecies to last his nine lifetimes that what Artephius just said did not really register in his brain at first. Until it sank in.

“Wait,” he choked out, “A _second_ prophecy?”

Oh _Felina_ , not this again.

“Yup!” He seemed pretty enthusiastic about this despite the dread that coiled in Puss’ stomach. “The Great Mage Sino has done a looot of preparations for this very moment, both for the San Lorenzans and the denizens of the Netherworld! And fortunately,” Artephius went to his shelves, fingered a few titles before glancing down at his feet and realizing ‘Aha, there it is!’ and picked up the book, “they predict that it is possible to undo it all.” He hefted the huge book with grunt and set the heavy thing down onto his desk with a hearty _thunk_ , then coughed when a cloud of brown dust erupted on his face.

“The Chosen One that would reveal the Evil One for who he truly is. These verses actually came from Zephilim literature! Well, let’s see…” He thumbed through the pages of his massive book, all the while muttering to himself words akin to ‘Ah! No…’ ‘Here! Nah…’ ‘Wait! Oh, not this…’

The silence left Puss thinking.

Zephilim literature, Artephius had said.

“…Zephilim?” Puss eventually echoed out his thoughts _._ “Aren’t they…”

 _‘The Chosen One!’_ he remembered the leader of the Zephilim warriors hail him, in that cave, not too long ago when they were rallying to overthrow the Blind King from the throne he had usurped from the Tiny Queen. _‘We believe that you are the One from the Ancient Prophecy!’_

More memories. More of this Chosen One business struggled to break out of the prison of the darker recesses of his mind.

_‘Puss of the Boots…’_

_‘We believe you are the Chosen One from the Ancient Prophecy.’_

_‘Don’t you remember passing the tests of the Zoon-Zaree?’_

_‘For centuries, we the Zephilims have continuously been seeking the hero who shall lead our army against an omen.’_

‘ _You are_ different _from the One of the Great Prophecy_.’

_‘Your role as the Chosen is yet to come…but it comes fast.’_

_‘You must seek the Great—’_

“Puss! Puss, what’s happening? Are you…?”

He hadn’t realized that he’d been gripping at the fur on his head with his paws under his hat before he snapped out of it.

He knew it for certain now. There was something _else_ he had to do, something _other_ than turn back time, but what? The harder he tried to grasp the fleeing fragments of his thoughts, the faster they flew away from his reach.

Why was his memory rebelling so much against him?

“…Do not worry about me.” He jumped up on Artephius desk so he could peer down at whatever the old alchemist was searching for in that huge, dusty book of his. He tilted his head so he could read it, but not being that much of an avid reader himself, the condensed text hurt his eyes. “What is this prophecy that you speak of? Does it speak for the victory of San Lorenzo?”

Ha.

He wished.

“It…speaks of…” Artephius thought for a while, only to come up with nothing. “Well, I don’t understand most of it, really. I just interpret it as, I don’t know…ah, I know! Do you know…the tale of the Sleeping Beauty? I mean, LOOK at this line! It just sounds just like it—”

The senile man babbled on about incoherent fairytales as if the world wasn’t about to get incinerated to bits because of a fiery apocalypse in a grand collision against another dimension.

Puss wanted to hit his forehead against the wall.

“Oh, _let me see that!_ ”

* * *

The Alpha and Sarge were at the rear, making certain that everyone stuck to each other and nobody strayed away lest they ended up being lost and starved and alone. The Beta led the pack. The bricked stonewalls around them ensured limited air space, and the floor was as oppressive as ice beneath their feet. Dust hovered in the air, having been stirred by their footfalls in probably the first time after centuries of their visitorless existence. The blue light of the torches the wolves brought with them only made the place seem all the more disturbing, because not only was the blue light unnatural—it also highlighted how gaunt their anxieties have made them.

Their bodies pressed against each other. It was hot, yet it was cold at the same time—the eerie combination of both made them sweat. There was a certain chill in the air that made them uneasy.

The corridors beyond seemed suffocatingly dark, making the impression of yawning mouths of void that would devour them to oblivion if anyone ever dared take a step closer. It made some wolves extremely clingy to those who carried a torch with them. It was, after all, their only source of radiance in this wretched prison.

The foul stench of death and decay wafted through the air, though it remained uncertain if the stench was of a physical or imaginative manifestation.

Cobwebs decorated the corners of the low ceiling. However, the spiders—or any insect or lifeform that had themselves unfortunately incarcerated in this miserable place—may have already long died. After all, no living thing could possibly stay in this place and still choose to breed…they’d most likely decide to spare their spawns from such a lonely, isolated existence.

This is the Forbidden Citadel.

“Alright, LISTEN UP!”

The command rippled through the musty air and reverberated multiple times against the walls before quieting down into a distant howl. The cramped corridors barely gave the wolves the space to breathe, but once they’ve travelled deep enough into the citadel, they found a wide enough cavern that allowed all nearly two hundred of them to gather. The Beta stood on a custom platform made from a couple of pieces of wood he’d found lying on a corner. Five corridors lay beyond the cavern, daring them to choose which path they think would lead them to the so-called heart of this place. The Beta insisted they conduct a congregation first before venturing further.

The pack’s guttural mutterings hushed down to let an expectant silence hang. Once satisfied of their obedience, the Beta spoke again.

“Now this ‘ere’s the plan,” he bellowed, voice deep and rough and aggressive. “We SEPARATE into groups of FIVE. From the back, you hear me?! GROUPS A’ FIVE! Me, the Alpha, Dess—”

“NO.” The Alpha’s voice rang firm and determined as he pushed through the masses of furry bodies and approached the Beta in front, Sarge hesitantly following him from behind. “ _No_. We ain’t doing that.”

“ _Hah?_ ” The second-in-command arched a sceptical eyebrow and appraised his superior with obvious displeasure as he approached. “We’ve got _five_ corridors, Boss, and the prisoner’s awaitin’. What do you propose we do, eh?”

“We can’t afford to separate. We stay together.”

“Boss, there’s _two hundred_ a’ us. We’re not _separatin’_.”

“You just said we SEPARATE into groups a’ FIVE, you IDIOT.”

“W-Well, OBVIOUSLY I didn’t mean _separate_ per se! Ya don’t have to worry abou’ one o’ us ending up a lone wolf, ‘cause as I said, we’re goin’ in _groups!_ GROUPS, y’ PEA-BRAIN.”

“You DARE call me a pea-brain?!”

“ _You_ called me an idiot!”

“THAT’S BECAUSE Y’WERE BEIN’ A’ ONE!”

They argued. And argued and argued and argued. The pack listened with uncertainty, some of them occasionally butting in to defend the arguments of one or the other. The hollow cavern reverberated with noise and the stink of men as the debate went on. On one paw, they were brothers and they can’t afford to have any of them to get lost. On the other paw, all their efforts would be moot if they didn’t at least accomplish their mission, and even the Alpha would have to admit that this mission was better accomplished sooner rather than later.

Besides, what could that single demon fairy shrimp actually _do_ to their pack? Annoy them with those obviously empty threats of hers?

Eventually, he conceded. The pack divided into groups of five. One each was led by the Alpha, the Beta, the third-in-command Fang, the Beta’s favourite Dess, and the Alpha’s favourite Sarge.

They gruffly exchanged Good lucks—they were _not_ saying Goodbyes—and walked into their respective voids, hoping they’d reach the heart of this cold merciless cruel godforsaken HEARTLESS citadel as soon as bloody _possible_.

* * *

“The Evil One soon will be freed,” she sang, and there it was—in her voice, there was that lilting, mystical quality, like a thousand other souls whispered from underneath her true self. During the brief blinding flash of light, she had somehow suddenly escaped from her cage and was now standing in the middle of the Treasure House, floating high in the air, her eyes mystical whiteholes with gallons of light pouring out of them.

“The Evil One shall soon arrive,” she declared. “ _It! Is! TIME!_ ”

“NO!” He scampered to the front to clarify this because there has GOT to be some sort of mistake.

(There was a prophecy…)

(A fallen, godly might…)

(…would rise…)

(…and engulf the world in flames.)

“Arrive?!” Evil Puss sputtered. “But I AM the Evil One! I’m already here! The Evil One from the Ancient Prophecy! The One who will destroy your world!”

 _No_ , he thought to himself, _I am the Evil One_. _I have read the prophecies. The literature of the Zephilim. The scrolls in that senile alchemist’s lousy old shop. It all fits in. The prophecy speaks of me. I was once a fallen emperor—_ (A fallen, godly might)— _and now, unless stopped, I shall fulfil my role with gleeful abandon to engulf this world in flames._

He looked up at Cleevil, unflinching.

There was no other one than _him_.

“I,” he repeated emphatically, “ _am_ the Evil One.”

Silence.

She looked down to appraise him.

He felt an invisible hand wrapping around his neck, lifting him up the air. The panic became official when his boots left the floor and all security he thought he had over the situation got so painfully peeled off his flesh like skin. He flailed his lower limbs as he struggled to breathe. He clawed at the invisible entity around his neck but that only made it tighten its grip. He felt his eyes water as the lack of air began to drive his body desperate to survive.

He was floating, yet his body was so heavy. He had been brought into the air right across the goblin girl.

He writhed.

He writhed, and he didn’t care if he looked pathetic—

He writhed, he wanted to _breathe_ —

This magic. This…this insensate, invisible, invasive magic. He had encountered this before. Invisible hands, invisible forces—he had suffered under this deviltry before, and he knew—he knew this girl shouldn’t have any connection with that demon, so why—why was this girl even wielding such power?

He _writhed_.

There was only one who should be able to wield this.

So why…?

Unless…?

He didn’t know what to think, overwhelmed as he was by panic. 

_…Who are you, Cleevil?_

With a dismissive _hmph_ from the girl, he suddenly felt those heavy hands physically _leaving_ the delicate sore around his neck and he fell through the air and slammed against the floor where he rolled over to absorb the impact, coughing and pounding on his chest and rubbing soothing circles around his neck.

“You…”

She raised her green hands into the air. The golden peacock throne—his glorious throne—from behind her followed her motions, then with a snap, it shrivelled into dust. The dust then swirled and swirled up into the air until it burst into a glittery golden explosion over the Treasure House, where everyone could only watch in frightened awe.

“You are not the Evil One,” she spat out in a disgusted tone. In a blinding flash of light, the statue of the Great Mage Sino was then returned right where it belonged, crushing the remnants of the golden throne underneath the stone platform. Its red eye glowed with sharp malice, covering the place with another brief flash of red light before she spoke again, her voice raised into unimaginable volumes.

This was not Cleevil.

“PEOPLE OF SAN LORENZO.” Her voice boomed. “I WARN YOU. The _True_ Evil One soon arrives, and you must prepare to defend yourselves. This vermin here…he is merely his _accessory_.”

_No. No. This can’t be._

He got up on his feet.

_Can’t be._

Scrambled his way out of there.

_Can’t be can’t be can’t be can’t be no no no no NO!_

He shut the doors close.

Leaned his back against them, breathing heavily.

_If I am not the Evil OnethenIhaveNOPURPOSE_

“…Weeeeell,” the Scimitar crooned. Oh, fantastic. The enchanted sword finally makes his presence known in his own uniquely irritating fashion.

“Well.” The Scimitar cleared his non-existent throat when he only flashed the sword a glare sharper than his very blade.

“So I guess that _didn’t_ go well?”

He slid down to the floor. Put a finger between his eyes.

When he opened them again, he was met by the concerned stares of his wolves. And the Scimitar.

He got up.

He will not be swayed. He will pursue his plan, fulfil his destiny as the Evil One, and conquer all the realms and have this one destroyed—oh, no, at first, he’d only wanted the justice he deserved by simply putting Puss in Boots out of this world for the humiliation he’d made him suffer, but no, no _this_ , this has gone way too out of hand, this has become more than personal, and he _loved_ it more this way, the bloodier, the _better_. A Phoenix out of the ashes, he will burn the world with his flames of demonfire—he will bear a formidable reputation, and none may dare mock his name again.

(He had to believe this was his fate. Because if this wasn’t what he was fated to do…)

Evil Puss swept an arm over at his guards, signalling them to come with him as he marched towards Artephius’ shop.

No more dilly-dallying.

(…then what?)

* * *

He read it again.

And again and again and again and again.

It seemed as if no matter how much he racked his brain for something, anything, a spark of an idea, an inkling of a thought, a shadow of a revelation, _anything at all_ , he cannot comprehend the cryptic words.

And because it was your typical prophecy stuff, it just _had_ to _rhyme_ , didn’t it?

_The One shall fall into slumber eternal_

_hidden in the Eye to protect the Mystical._

_And only by the Chosen can it be awakened_

_for their fates are still theirs to be written._

_As darkness eternal on San Lorenzo looms_

_Beware of the Evil One who brings your doom._

…what did it all mean?

He jumped from Artephius’ desk and began to pace. Back and forth and back and forth and back and forth, anxious and restless and bubbling with bottled up panic. He held the mercuric chalk in his one paw. He was ready to go and do what he had to do, to turn back time and _fix this already_ , but his will…

It dwindled.

With a new prophecy thrown into the mix, he couldn’t just ignore it. A long time ago, he might have laughingly brushed aside the ludicrousness of it, but after having been entangled in one too many prophecies some time ago, he had to pause and consider before he did anything rash. Maybe there’s something in the verses, a clue, something that could warn him, or aid him, or inform him of anything, really, just _anything_. He was that desperate. He was already rushing into this blind. The only things he carried with him were his daring and honour, but that was not enough. He knew absolutely nothing. It was not even his idea to have this chalk created—it had only been implanted into his mind by a vision of Sino.

But then even Artephius expressed that the Sino in his vision could have been faked.

Then there was that underlying suspicion that Evil Puss and the Scimitar…he paused and gazed at the chalk that he pressed between his thumb and his forefinger.

What if he had all been set up?

The One. An Eye. The Mystical. The Chosen.

He was not the best when it came to critical thinking, that much he could admit, but even _he_ wasn’t blind to the fact that there were far too many unknown variables at play here. He was used to launching his full body right into the gaping maws of danger and improvising from there, but this was something he cannot just face without pausing for a moment. Because if he slipped…if he _left_ this timeline and the decision was wrong…

There would be no place for improvising.

He would have no other chance to redeem himself.

“‘As darkness eternal on San Lorenzo looms,’” he muttered pensively to himself as Artephius’ gaze followed him move as he resumed his walk, back and forth and back and forth and back and forth. “I know not what to think of this. ‘Beware of the Evil One who brings your doom…?’” He whirled around to snap at his companion, a dreadful idea having suddenly popped in his head. “Who do you reckon—“

The doors were suddenly blasted into bits and splinters with the lucent force of a blue fireball, sending Puss’ back against Artephius’ desk. He groaned and slumped down to the ground, then growled as a boot stepped right in front of him. He raised his head to meet his own face.

“That’s right, _kneel_ before me,” Evil Puss simpered, both his paws placed haughtily on his hips. “Beware of ME, who brings your DOOM.”

_Get up, get up—in no way would I kneel before this vile degenerate._

He clenched his fists.

“Ah. I understand it now.” He pushed himself up and made sure to stand with a veneer of strength in his façade, communicating with his body alone for him to _Step back, you are in my space._

“You are the Evil One the prophecy speaks of.”

Sure enough, Evil Puss took a step back, but the mockery on his expression did not dissolve one bit.

“ _Aw_ , I see you _READ_ it! _Thank you_ for being the first to see me for who I REALLY AM!”

Puss could see Artephius frown suspiciously from his peripheral vision, but the alchemist said nothing.

The Scimitar hovered right beside his wielder. His lupine goons flanked him. There were wolves in the doorway, wolves inside the shop, wolves right behind him. Most of them held a weapon—a torch. He counted fifteen or so goons.

At the least.

He protectively curled his fingers around the chalk in his palm and subtly hid it from Evil Puss’ sight. This was his only chance at redeeming himself. He was vastly outnumbered. He realized that even he cannot fight this much. If he lost the chalk to them, then it was game over.

He prayed that Evil Puss knew nothing of his plans, because Felina Felina _Felina_ , if he _did_ , then he was going to be so, so screwed.

“Why are you doing this, Evil Puss?” he ventured, cautiously, carefully. He had to be careful not to sound arrogant in his prepositions, else he triggered this—this evilly perverted twin of his. “The world is about to be destroyed in an apocalypse, yet you are bent on destroying me instead. You live here as well. It would be in our mutual interest if we worked together. Let us abandon this petty skirmish between the two of us, and focus on the more important things. _Please_.”

“Yeah, like catnaps, maybe?”

Puss stiffened. Artephius. He had piped up so stupidly in the middle of the conversation. Oh, _Artephius_ , you should have just kept your mouth shut.

Evil Puss frowned and arched a displeased eyebrow. Then he snapped two fingers in the air.

“Take down the old fart; I have use for him no longer.”

The wolves obeyed and immediately fired a shot at the alchemist. Before Puss’ eyes, Artephius suddenly got slammed by a blue force against the wall before he slumped back down onto the ground like a limp vegetable.

“ARTEPHIUS!”

“And let me take this.”

In his haste, he had left his paw vulnerable, and Evil Puss had so easily snatched the chalk right from his grip.

Wait—no.

He stepped back around and flared at Evil Puss.

_“NO!”_

Smirking an infuriating smirk, Evil Puss snapped his fingers once again, and two wolves came forward to stop Puss from attacking their Master.

Nonononono ** _no_** nono!

He flailed. Violently. Kicked and punched and screamed a series of rapid-fire Spanish profanity that he could only be glad Dulcinea was not here to witness him for the desperate wretch he had transmogrified into.

His only chance—

His only damn _chance_ —

_Gone!_

What had he done wrong?

Had his sins been so great to deserve this anguish?

Why?

_Why?_

_Why is it, that the world would never deem anything I do to be enough?_

He did not know how long it lasted, but it didn’t matter. This moment of madness—it made him see red, and everything was a blur, and more and more wolves had come to help restrain him, but _darn it,_ Felina, nothing mattered except that chalk, his only key, his last remaining key to fixing this mess, and this rascal, this degenerate, this vile monstrous petty fiend—

All because of his petty, _petty_ desire for _petty_ revenge!

Eventually, he tired out. He was left a gasping mess, his eyes bloodshot, and his throat wounded from all the screaming. He hung limply on the wolves’ restraining arms.

And Evil Puss was standing there, _grinning right at him_.

“That’s right, that’s right,” he sassed, “Let it all out. It’s healthy to be angry. It will aaaaall blow over soon.”

“Why…are you…” Speaking hurt. But he spoke anyway. “Why are you _doing this?_ I am _sorry_ , alright? I am sorry. I get it. My foolish actions overthrew you from emperorhood, forced you to live in our world instead. I had no right to meddle with the businesses in your universe—and for that, _I am sorry._ But when you ruled the Netherworld, endangered San Lorenzo, endangered _all_ who I hold precious…I had to do it. I deposed you. It wrongly made you think you are the victim—wrongly made you think it _warranted_ you to exact vengeance upon me. But…I am the one asking you for forgiveness now. Then we can skip all this. We are running out of time. The world…this world is…about to be destroyed, and _you have to let me go_.”

He was tired and beaten up, but the ferocity remained in his bright green eyes.

“Abandon your hatred,” he firmly ground out. “All of that is the past.”

For a second, for the briefest flash of a second, something moved behind Evil Puss’ grinning mask.

“…Oh,” he said, lowering his paws to the side.

“Oh ha,” he continued, bringing his paws up to cover his face.

Then he exploded.

“OH HA HA HA HA _HA!_ ”

Unease injected the air with poison as even his lupine goons shifted from foot to foot uncomfortably.

“Oh dear, oh my,” he gasped in the lapses of his hysteria.

“What a _lovely_ speech!” he wailed to the ceiling.

“If I abandon my hatred,” he continued sputtering out between cackles, “ _NOTHING_ will be left of me!”

“That—that is _not_ true, Puss in Boots—“

“Don’t you DARE liken me to you,” he fired back, immediately regaining his composure with anger. “ _Evil_ Puss is my name. No, actually…” He neared his face to Puss and grasped his chin in a paw.

“I’d rather you call me the Evil One.”

Puss, disgusted, jerked his chin out of the villain’s grasp.

He chuckled. “Well, well, _well_.” He brought the chalk back up to his face with two fingers as if to carefully inspect it. “What _is_ this little magic chalk you’ve been creating, though, I wonder?”

A growl rumbled from deep in Puss’ throat, and he felt a new surge of anger flare from within him.

“It is nothing that concerns—“

“Oh, it _concerns_ me alright, it deeply _concerns_ me,” he cut off, sounding way too gleeful about this turn of events than he probably normally should. “How _dare_ you undo this timeline and undo all the things I’ve already achieved? How dare you bring all my hard work to _waste?_ You are only fooling yourself, _Puss in Boots_. This is ‘time-manipulation’ chalk, _isn’t it_.” Derision underlined his every word. “You plan on going back in time so that you can undo everything _bad_ that happened to you.”

If he wasn’t already tense, the tension in his muscles only curled even tighter.

Evil Puss was not supposed to know this.

“How—how did you know that, you— _you—_ ”

“And you keep calling me a coward,” he continued nonchalantly, “when you keep thinking that running away and leaving all the mess you did behind will solve all of your problems. You never _did_ develop a _maturity_ to _handling_ your own _problems_.” Another one of those devilish smirks. “A history of running away, I presume…?”

His anger was back in full force. “YOU HAVE _NOT_ ANSWERED MY QUESTION!”

“And you refuse to acknowledge that all you’re trying to do here _is_ run away,” he calmly retorted. “There are many things you still don’t know, Puss, many, _many_ things. Things like you are just a puppet in the grand scheme of things, tied on the strings of destiny. There are many things you will never know…because by the time this all unravels, you’ll be long dead.”

He gave him one last sidelong smile before snapping at his goons.

“Bring him to the crater.”

“No,” he protested, surprised to find some more strength in him to fight. “Unhand me. Unhand me!”

The way Evil Puss held that expressionless look on his face, it was maddening, just _maddening_.

“It would be easier for everyone else if you just gave up, Puss in Boots.”

“You—” Something caught in his throat. “What do you want with me?”

“Oh dear oh dear oh dear,” he mockingly lamented. “Seems like you don’t truly understand! It’s not what I want to do _with_ you, it’s what I want to do _to_ you. I have prepared nothing but the most exquisite pain for you, Bootsie, and you know what?”

He walked back to him, each step of the boot against the floor a hollow, empty sound.

He leaned in to whisper the malicious words into his ear.

“It involves _her_.”

It produced the desired effect.

Puss’ pupils contracted into feral slits.

“You dare.” This anger was silent. Far more violent. “Keep your filthy paws off of her, Evil Puss…or I will not hesitate to kill you once I get the chance again.”

Evil Puss shook his head, and everyone could _hear_ the Scimitar roll his eyes in the breathy sigh he expelled.

“You have forgotten that I just _hate_ it when you _threaten_ me. Very well then. It seems that you could use a little…”

He backhanded him across the face.

Grinned.

“…discipline.”

The wolves let Puss go and he stumbled to the ground on his knees, coughing up blood before Evil Puss’ feet.

 


	15. Her Nightmare Come True

The sunset’s spillage of rose-inked fire blazed over the still surface of the lake. Thin wisps of pastel smoke streaked the warmly emblazoned sky. Thousands of beads of fresh dew jumped from vivid, viridian leaves as a soft breeze rustled the trees, having finally arrived from its far-off travels and ending its journey within the forest’s welcoming nest.

Birds twittered as they flew to the fiery red sun in flocks of Vs. Her book was open on her lap, its pages ruffling and shuffling as if the breeze itself was leafing through its pages searching for words of wit and wisdom to bring with it in its further journeys. Dulcinea, seated atop a boulder with her picnic basket containing weird assortments of onions and garlic beside her, hummed a happy tune, feeling her silken lavender dress ripple over her legs, which dangled mindlessly against the stone. She then closed her eyes with a contented sigh, the ever-whispering wind caressing her cheeks. Although, weirdly enough, despite the wind, the book on her lap had stopped its ruffling and shuffling and stopped on a page where a single esoteric rhyme was meticulously penned in a complicatedly thin and elegant script.

_Wise men say only fools rush in,  
that those who love are made fools therein._

She leaned her head to the side, fully expecting a warm and furry ginger shoulder where she could snugly tuck herself in. A minor frown settled on her face when her head met nothing but air instead of the furry shoulder she was expecting, so what she did was inch further, just a little bit more…

But still, no one.

Still keeping her eyes closed, she drew in a breath, feeling her small heart pound. Then she boldly let her paw drift, hesitating for only a second before decidedly bringing it down to capture his in the warm cup of her palm.

Except there was nothing to capture but cold stone.

She opened her eyes again to look beside her, only to be mildly befuddled.

Nothing beside her but empty air.

She looked around her, at the peace and tranquillity, at the scenery she knew had been _meant_ to be for her and—and someone else.

Hmmm.

Strange.

Suddenly, she could feel a sense of wrongness brewing somewhere from the depths of her brain.

She had been sitting here for…well, she could vaguely remember and she wasn’t even counting, but hours could have passed and she never even would have noticed. Like she had been lulled in a peacefully hypnotic half-sleep. Her senses were active and she could feel the acuity so vividly it was overwhelming, but they were also made dull and dense, smothered over by an otherworldly drowsiness. For all of those hours, she could have sworn with her life that there was someone else beside her this whole time. Someone who made her stomach do strange things like flips or dances or crazy somersaults. Someone whom her heart beat for.

Closing her book and settling it beside her picnic basket of onions and garlic, she pushed herself off the boulder, feeling the satisfying _thump-thump_ of her heels against the soft wet ground. Something in her itched, questioning why the basket weirdly even contained _onions and garlic_ of all things, but the answer seemed so distant and blurry, twinkling at her from some other universe so far away that it might as well not exist in this one. So she banished the thought. She had more things to concern herself with.

Beginning with the fact that she was even here.

She scoured her brain for memories. For that one tiny thread or crumb of bread that she could follow back to figure out where she’d come from before things led up to…this. Stranger still, she could remember none.

Nothing.

If she’d even had the mind to leave breadcrumbs in the first place, then they had been religiously plucked off the ground by wandering ravens because to her horror, her mind was a blank slate. Nothing nothing _nothing._ It dawned on her with mild alarm that she absolutely had no semblance of a trail to follow back, no strand of memory to retrace, not the thinnest, tiniest thread that connected this fragile yet blissfully dreamlike world to the harsh yet secure solidity of reality.

The birds disappeared into the distance. The absence of their musical twittering left her in stifling silence, broken only when the wind suddenly forced her book open and ruffled through its pages, making her snap her gaze back to the top of the boulder where it rested.

And she watched, blue eyes growing wide as the wind ruffled and shuffled through the book’s crisp brown leaves of parchment paper, never reaching the end as if stuck in an infinite loop of leafing through page after page after page after page after page after page after page after page after page after page after—

_“Dulcinea!”_

Squeaking out an involuntary _Eeep!_ , Dulcinea tripped over her own feet, stumbling so her back was flat against the oppressive coldness of the boulder. Apparently, that screaming whisper of her name was the snap that knocked her off of the trance induced by the book’s hypnotic ruffling.

Breathless, she looked deep into the groaning forest where the voice had come from.

What the fiddlefuff was…

The book continued to ruffle and shuffle from behind her. Her ears twitched and she shut her eyes close with her paws gripping at the stone behind her, the book continuing its royally annoying frustrating _maddening_ –

An irritated growl erupted from her hoarse throat when she turned around and firmly flattened the pages with both paws to silence it. The ire, however, was immediately doused by cold liquid ice when her eyes landed upon the pair of pages under her arrest and found them blank.

Blank.

Nothing. Nada. Zilch. Instead of the rhyme she’d expected to see, instead of the couplet she’d hoped would calm her suddenly frayed nerves, the pages were ridiculously, senselessly, unnaturally blank.

She took a hold of the book and flipped a page. And another. And another, and another, and when she realized that the entire infinity-paged book was _blank_ —

She shut it with both her paws and vehemently tossed the thing over the lake.

She heard no splash.

And for all she knew, all she’d done was cruelly set the book on an endless journey of orbiting the globe for the rest of its eternity.

She straightened up, her whiskers stiffening in place as they stuck straight out. The leaves rustled from the forest behind her. Her eyes turned feline. Her heart thudded, its shallow, erratic beats foretelling danger. Her fingers curled. The black mouthless lake greedily swallowed up the sun’s light as the disc of fire sank into its depths. Around her, the colours dimmed, shadows became darkness, and the wind seemed to blow a little bit harsher, its tell-tale whispers becoming bites of frost.

_“….cinea!”_

She was vaguely aware of a voice injecting the air as the sky mutely moved above her and the world underneath her feet remained eerily still. She staggered back and leaned against the boulder, suddenly dizzy, dizzy, although all her muffled brain could think of blaming was the world’s constant spinning motion.

Stupid world. Stupid brain.

_“Dulcinea!”_

She looked behind her, still supporting her body against the boulder. 

That came from the forest.

_“DULCINEA!”_

It was definitely someone. Someone needed her help. And she knew that voice, but she didn’t like to admit that she knew it because that voice was in pain and she was so pathetically powerless to _help_. She had to…had to…snap out of this. This weird feeling that kept holding her back. If only she could put a name to…

Vertigo. Yes. Okay. That’s right. Good brain. This was vertigo. The feeling when you suddenly stand up after hours of reading a small book or two in one sitting, or when you suddenly bolt right up after snapping out of a dream, or when you stand on something high and look down and realize the threat of falling and the world crashing around you. Yes. Vertigo.

She calmed herself.

_“Dulcinea!”_

And pushed herself from the boulder. She couldn’t figure out why her brain was rebelling against her so much, but this time she had a name to match who the voice belonged to, and there was one thing she knew: she would never let it go.

_“…Puss!”_

—oOo—

Wolves were crap at emotions. Excuse him for the inelegant word choice, but there was literally no other word that perfectly described his species’ utter _c r a p p i n e s s_ when it came to expressing their _feelings_. Blegh. Just the word made him wanna puke.

See? Many would call that kind of overreaction immature.

Not that he gave a crap about what others thought of him.

(Well, the Beta wolf actually _did_ give a crap, once you peel off the thick layers of his armour of leather and iron you’d see nothing inside but a snivelling ball of fur who liked being petted by your fingers behind the ears because he’s such a pup that way, but he wouldn’t ever have the guts to admit that to himself. Much less aloud.)

From a very young age, wolves had been tended to by their mothers, sure. They were better off, than, say, frogs, ‘cause the little tadpoles never hadta meet their momma at all and the poor saplings got ta manage their own since birth. But them wolves, they’s were different. They’s had a lot of love from their families and their social communities. But, even if some were living objectively worse lives…it didn’t diminish the quality of emotional and physical suffering the others experienced. Unfortunately, suffering’s subjective, yo. And everyone had different thresholds for suffering. But, but see, the thing was, the level of pain, once that threshold is broken, feels EXACTLY the same for every sentient creature nature had ever crafted. At least, if justice even existed underneath all this unfairness of life, that must be how it should work. Wolves, as children, were taught that they were born so they could help feed the entire pack. That very soon they’d have to leave the warm cuddly safety of their parents’ arms and they’d be thrust into a whole new world that suddenly seemed so very large and impossible and dangerous. At least that was better than tadpoles, right? Because theys saplings got ta manage their own since birth, but wolves had their parents.

So then he’d told his parents, teach me how to live. And they had, they did their best, but most of the time they didn’t make sense. How to hunt, or kill a living meat, or kill a living meat without feeling just a little terrible inside for doing that to someone else. ‘Survival of the fittest, son,’ his father, the former Beta, would say. ‘Just how nature works. Never question it.’

So again he’d ask his parents, how do you live? How _should_ we live? They’d shake their heads and tell him that the answer to that question was something better figured out on one’s own. So that was what he did. And he realized years later the _real_ reason they didn’t answer him that question was because, because even though they acted like they knew everything as all parents should, they didn’t know jack.

They. Did. Not. Know. Jack.

And turns out, no one does.

From that day on, he’d never been able to shake off that horrible feeling that he wasn’t here for any grand scheme of fate. That the only reason he was even here was 1) because he was born, unfortunately, and 2) because he hadn’t died yet. Unfortunately.

Olvid was the youngest, the tiniest, and the sickliest of his mother’s litter of four pups when he was born. Yeah, his name was Olvid. Kinda sucked, but he was stuck with it. He had three older siblings. They were all girls, but since they were older, they had more of the right for the Beta position than he ever had. Their society never had a rule against preventing the femme from authority—it was just that most consciously chose to do the taking care of babies stuff.

Once his and his sisters’ coming-of-age day, their thirteenth birthday, arrived, all four of them were required to venture to the forest and bring back home the fruit of their hunt. Part of their tradition. But, his father made it a game. Whoever brings home the meat first out of the four of them shall henceforth be known as Beta-apparent.

And that day turned out to be the worst day of his life. Since he was the weakling, his sisters, believing themselves stronger and faster than he was, had told him he would be safer behind the bushes.

And so it was from behind the bushes that he watched his sisters get slaughtered by a roaring bear.

What Olvid had done next was a blur of memory. He’d emerged out of the bushes with angry tears in his eyes and stabbed the monster in the back with the Melquior Dragon’s tooth his favourite sister Nehra gave him for his twelfth birthday.

When he came home, heavy with the tragedy, no one seemed to care. He was immediately hailed as the Beta-apparent now that his sisters were out of the way. As if he didn’t just frickin’ watch his sisters’ innards get stuck on that bear’s ugly, raggedy, bloodied yellow teeth.

And then, that was when he realized it.

His father trained him how to kill, how to do it right: without guilt or remorse.

His sisters weren’t.

They were all sent out there, him trained, them _not at all_.

Sure, his sisters were fed lies about how good they were, but that was only so they didn’t have to strive harder. But him, his father had to call him a runt or a weakling or a useless wuss every day so that he strived harder. He always thought it was unfair that he was being treated so harshly than his sisters were.

But after having watched his sisters die, he realized that they were the ones being treated harshly.

He didn’t exactly feel a profound sense of justice after that realization came upon him.

All he felt, despite being so cruelly trained not to feel _anything_ about the natural reality of death, was anger and hatred and vengeance and resentment against it.

He was angry at Death.

Much as he resented Death, though, he didn’t mind killing _other_ species, just as humans didn’t mind killing others for their food. Sure, most of everyone stereotyped his kind as savage, but most of everyone was usually your regular ignorant meat that thought it was the most intelligent being _evah_.

Meaning if his brothers got hurt, then he’d easily be the most violent killer the world has ever seen.

And he’d pay anyone, anyone at all, every second of his remaining life a quality of loyalty only wolves can give, if they would just tell him advice how, exactly, you kill a shadow.

Because this bastardess? She was _literally_ a shadow.

He stood there, now a grown up wolf wielding weapons and leading armies and stuff, an anxious heart beating inside the soft and furry chest covered by layers of iron and leather.

He and his pack of thirty-something comrades stood stock still. They were in some sort of hall, shelves upon shelves stacking up the walls, like some kind of library, so they had space, unlike the corridors. So at least they had that. But that provided him little comfort, because bigger spaces meant more places to hide. A sensation of darkness had descended upon them, and he could feel his wolves taking a step closer to him. They looked to him as their leader after all, and aside from the terrible weight of the black shadows slowly creeping around them, he felt with unclouded clarity the weight of responsibility on his shoulders. He should protect his wolves, his pack. No matter what.

He knew this, subconsciously. But consciously, his brain drew an utter _blank_.

A couple of screams sounded from behind him.

“S-Sir…” said the wolf nearest to him. His name was Alrys. The Beta always remembered names, although he never admitted it and often pretended he knew nothing about anyone. Best to keep an emotional distance, after all.

“Mento and Hadere are missing,” Alrys continued. “The ones at the front say.”

Then another.

“Sir…that’s from Gundin. And his folks.”

And another.

“Thysand, and…”

And another.

“Worthe. Yire. Kali.”

Another scream, this time more than three. Or seven.

“Sir…” Alrys was trembling now. “Aves and his brothers are gone. What do we do?”

He didn’t answer for a while. Some shamans from back in their home in their own dimension would probably say that he was undergoing from some kind of catatonic shock due to sudden traumatic flashbacks as brutally triggered by a very, very triggering environment.

“Sir,” Alrys almost squeaked. “What do we do?”

Then he gave Alrys the answer his parents had always given him.

“I…don’t know.”

The shadows were like ink, and they spilled from underneath the creaks of doors and the cracks in the stone brick walls. They crawled up the ceiling, covering everything in black, suffocating them in the darkness.

_“Ah…you admit you don’t know? Then I admire you.”_

He took a step back and looked at the ceiling as if he could see the source of the words there. He didn’t. The voice, when it spoke, it echoed everywhere, and he could recognize who it belonged to. That she-devil bastardess guardian from the gate.

_“You are brave, because you venture into the unknown. Many would chicken out of that challenge.”_

It was dark now, and that was saying something, because being natural predators, wolves were _supposed_ to be good at seeing through the night. But this black presence, it wasn’t _like_ the night. It wasn’t like any kind of blackness he ever had the displeasure to encounter in his life at all.

_“At least, I guess I could give you that credit.”_

This blackness was pure. This was blackness never before seen.

Only experienced.

“ _Sir_ ,” insisted his messenger. “What do we do?”

 _What should we do?_ Then it clicked to him that those who were gone and swallowed by the living darkness _might_ be dead, because like the young pup named Olvid, he’s hiding behind the comfort of the bushes and doing absolutely nothing.

He didn’t really snap out of his paralysis yet, but his subconscious knew what to do, at least. So he let it say whatever the hell it wanted to say.

“…Run.”

And so they did. They ran from the shadow chasing them, and it cackled like the demon it was as if mocking their cowardice. She even patronizingly slowed down her pursuit so they could get a headstart. Seemed like the devil girl liked playing with her food. In that moment, the Beta was once again little Olvid—cursing the perverted prey/predator system nature has established, like that snowy day back in his thirteenth, running away from his sisters’ freshly murdered bodies on piles of stained snow.

One by one, as he ran through corridors, he lost his comrades.

And the Red Sheevra was only satisfied once he was alone, her grating voice vanishing along with the weight of the darkness and shadows.

He stood for a moment as the corridor he was in was suddenly lit up by rows and rows of torches. Magic? Who cares. After the hellish pursuit came a heavy silence. Silence, and not a pat on the back, not a celebratory howl, not a collective sigh of relief. Nothing. It was just him and the hallway.

He leaned against the wall. Made his forehead make contact with the cold stone.

Then he wept.

He wept for the sisters he failed, and then for the brothers he failed. It felt good, honestly. This was maybe the first time in his life he ever shed a coupla tears. No one was there to judge him, not his father, not his comrades, nobody.

So he wept years’ worth of tears, because why the heck not.

But afterward—and this is the important thing—he wiped them away.

He still had brothers out there.

—oOo—

Wolves were brothers. Well, not technically, but that was just how they liked to refer to themselves, and anyway, what could you do about it huh? If you don’t agree then get off the boat. That was the kind of attitude they used in confronting anyone who disagreed with them, and frankly it was effective. Even if each individual wolf wasn’t exactly a relative by blood, the bonds they formed with one another could’ve betrayed anyone who didn’t know better.

And no one did know better.

Because despite the occasional friendliness, wolves can also be vicious creatures. Even to one another.

Hey, what’d you expect? They had politics among them.

They had a hierarchy. A leader. A commander, of sorts. And below the commander was the lieutenant, and below the lieutenant was the lieutenant colonel, and below the lieutenant colonel was whatever the hell came next after the lieutenant colonel, because wolves didn’t give a damn about how human military ranks worked.

They only knew how _theirs_ worked.

An Alpha, then a Beta, then a third-in-command called the Gamma, if the two major leaders agreed that a wolf was worthy enough of the rarely open position for a third-in-command.

But then, as it worked centuries ago, once in a while a wolf would come by and challenge the norms of their lupine society, often by blaming the government. That wolf would then challenge the Alpha to a duel, so he could replace him and the rules—or lack thereof—imposed by the government.

It was often a fight to the death. And often ugly. This particular pack’s generation could still remember their grandpas telling them tales of how there was never a duel that did _not_ end up with some poor runt getting assigned to cleaning duty, aka ‘get the viscera off the floor by the morning or it’d be your turn to get disembowelled.’

The current Alpha’s great-great-great-he-wasn’t-sure-how-many-greats grandfather, appropriately dubbed Alpha the Great…that was what he did. Alpha the Great questioned the bloody and brutal and utterly barbaric process of picking pack leaders, and killed the Alpha of the time to replace him and the medieval lack of lawlessness. 

It was funny, in an ironic sort of way, because Alpha the Great sought to stop Alphacides by killing an Alpha himself. But murder was a price A. the Great had been willing to pay for the peace that came to their society afterwards.

Alpha the Great decreed that, from then on, leadership positions in their pack should not be acquired through killing, but through direct blood.

And so the importance of heirs and firstborns emerged for the first time.

It was less violent than the previous method, but it wasn’t exactly pretty either. Because firstborns became important, sibling murders emerged. You know. The usual. And not everyone agreed to the new model either. Some conservative wolves still said that the strongest of the pack should kill the leader if he wanted to become the Alpha. The blood the challenger spills would be proof enough of his worthiness for the role. After all, what’s the difference? Siblings killing siblings defeated the original peaceful purpose of the monarchical method of passing titles down. But, most would argue that fratricide cases occurred rarely in lupine history, making it less bloody than the previous Alphacide method, essentially earning the pro- side of the argument some brownie points. And besides, most had already conformed to the newer, monarchic, less bloody process of handing titles down, and, conformity being a strong social force, the conservative minority usually just shut their pieholes and kept their rebellious remarks within themselves. Wolves had no written record, because words were for the crippled half of society desperately scrambling for self-esteem by insisting on the non-existent importance of poetry. Survival, however, _that_ was the language they spoke, and with it they passed their stories down through word of mouth, making the system established by Alpha the Great survive to this day.

So then, the current Alpha inherited his position as pack leader from a long line of generations of Alphas that inherited their position from Alpha the Great.

And, truth be told, this wasn’t exactly something the Alpha had particularly signed up for when he was born. Heck, he didn’t even ask to be born in the first place.

Much less deal with this kind of stress.

“BACK!” he bellowed, wildly gesturing for his wolves to retreat. The corridor was shallow, so many of them stumbled and those who followed from behind them stumbled right after, too. The Alpha resisted the urge to smack his forehead. Morons, the lot of them. If any of them _died_ , that was completely their fault, because they were such morons. At least, that was what he would _like_ to believe. Because he knew that if any of them died, the blood was on _his_ paws.

He growled, ran back, hauled a fallen brother up on his feet so the rest of the wolves from behind could catch up and begin running their asses off. The shadow’s cackling grew louder and louder from behind them. Several wolves, tired from running, began to slow down from the far end of the line, and most had already slumped down onto walls and slid to the floors or really just fell flat on the floor without much fashion.

He could see black ink crawling on the walls. The shadows somehow getting bitingly colder. Darkness somehow beginning to have a physical suffocating weight to it. The cackle grew louder. She’s getting closer. She’s just a shadow form, really. It didn’t take the Alpha long to realize, since they’ve separated into five groups, that the Red She-demon guarding the Forbidden Citadel’s gate wasn’t joking when she said she was gonna have fun messing with them with her trickeries. Her power, he discovered, was imitating the wolves’ greatest fear: separation. Wolves were social creatures. Wolves were brothers. They couldn’t stand isolation. But what better way to impose isolation upon them than by embodying Darkness itself? Terrible little demon brat with her awesome powers.

What? Something could be awful and impressive at the same time.

He hoped the others were faring well.

He somehow doubted it.

“GET UP, YOU LAZY SISSIES!” he commanded, but then none of the fallen wolves listened. They were already knocked out by exhaustion. Maybe by breathing the poison of that black shadow, he had no idea. He counted them. Ten. Damn. He already lost about twenty earlier.

The cackle grew closer, and he knew, as he breathed the foul stench of darkness in the air, that he’d be next if he didn’t get out of there.

With a heavy heart, he fled, determined to protect his thirteen remaining brothers and vowing to the fallen ones that their sacrifice would not be in vain.

—oOo—

Wolves were loyal to the death.

That was both their asset and their weakness. Their strength and their downfall. Their curse and their blessing. Their beauty and their beast. Their light and their…well, you get the idea.

Sarge, he was a loyal one. If his master told him to fetch, he would. If his master told him to wag his tail like an idiot, he would. If his master commanded him to kill some unfortunate toad, he would.

And he wasn’t any different from any of his brothers.

Before they ever even came here in this world—which was, in his opinion, the boringest place he’d ever been in—they’d been the Royal Soldiers of the House of Nine Tales. The shortest version of their world’s history lesson would say that a society emerged thousands of years ago and cats became the rulers and the noble ones. Queen Felicia was the first of them, and she brought peace and so much prosperity to the lands that many cats revered her and prayed to her as their Goddess. Humans came in second in their society, as lords managing the lands and whatnot, and dogs became the humans’ servants. The dogs were silent about this arrangement, but the humans were loudmouthed about it, unsatisfied with them not being on the throne. So an uprising came, since the humans, being the greedy hairless pencil-necked bipeds that they are, wanted to seize the power.

And they did. The first human king, dubbed Teddy the Terrible by the wolves because what kind of fear-inducing name was Teddy, commanded that all cats be made pets and all dogs be driven out of the land because apparently, Teddy the Terrible was phobic of dogs. Centuries passed. The wolves learned to live on their own, formed complex societies, killed others for their food. Cats became pets, and some of them became thieves, rebelling against the domestic role Teddy the Terrible had imposed upon them. Humans rose, became the nobles, but then those humans drove their fellow humans down the level of cats. Historical analysts would note that the difference between the Feline Monarchy and the human one was that humans were _bad_ at it, often fighting amongst each other and achieving nothing in their empire but blood. Until a cat of terrible ambition sought to change it.

Emperor Puss in Boots became the name next— _emperor_ , because he’d turned their kingdom into an empire. He made sure to make the wolves who he rescued from the Winter Mountains be the guardians of his castle and empire, ending the reign of the House of Humans and resuming the House of Nine Tails after decades of hiatus. He drove all humans down to the level of serfs, servants. Apparently he had a lot of anger against the world, because he ruled the empire with an iron fist. Not everyone agreed with him, though. Not even his fellow felines thought that it was the right thing to do, to mercilessly kill even the human babies who did nothing wrong. 

But Sarge didn’t mind. He’d been starving in the freezing Winter Mountains when Puss in Boots stepped into their lands and fed them human meat. His stomach had never been fuller. He’d been so close to death—his brothers had been so close to death—but then Puss in Boots came, rescued them from their starvation, and promised them glory and gold and a much better life than living for scraps, if they helped him rip apart the House of Humans and hand back the throne to him. Him, the first feline to again resume the House of Nine Tails centuries after Queen Felicia first established it.

He ruled the empire for years, believing that being feared was better than being loved in order to be respected. The rules were strict, and even the slightest slight against the Emperor was punished with death through the guillotine. As a result of the martial lawfulness, their empire had a crime rate of zero. Mostly. There were a few rebellions here and there clamouring for freedom of speech, but they were quickly silenced by the wolves whenever their Master commanded them.

Their lives had been going pretty well actually, compared to the lives they led in eternal winter, but that was only until their Master had been sucked into an unknown portal.

The sudden disappearance of their Master gave courage to the rebels, and soon an Empress Dulcinea emerged and got ready to seize the empty throne.

She commanded that all wolves be driven back to whence they came, and never again sow violence upon her new empire.

With no one to put their trust and loyalty to, the wolves retreated, back in the mountains of eternal winter. It was only understandable when, ten long years later, their Master came back, haggard and rasping and a shivering ball of anger, and, like he did all those years ago, told them that it was time they got back to their business of conquering empires.

Only this time he was determined to conquer empires from other _worlds_.

And they followed him.

They followed because they were loyal like that, especially to anyone who showed them even the tiniest scraps of kindness when no one else would, when everyone else would shoo them away. 

They followed him and never questioned it when they saw a spark of madness in those green eyes.

They followed him and never questioned it when he’d tell them to go to places no one ever dared ventured.

They followed him and never questioned it, but Sarge wondered if that should extend to times when he told them to go kill themselves.

Because that was what he must’ve basically commanded them to do when he sent them to do this ridiculous errand just for a prisoner they never even knew.

“CODE RED! RETREAT! That musta be the she-devil from earlier, THAT’S THE—“

He was cut off when the shadow cackled her vicious cackle.

_“Who are you talking to, little boy?”_

The dust settled. He found himself alone. He cursed under his breath and forced his legs to move. He hated the torches that lit up along his way. At least, when it was dark, the dark felt honest and true. This light felt deceiving and mocking.

_“I think I like you.”_

He ran. There. A door. A door. That must lead somewhere, right? Because that’s what doors do.

_“Go on, run for the door.”_

He didn’t hear her words, but he followed anyway.

_“You’re weak, but your will is strong.”_

The door became bigger as he closed the distance.

_“And that is why, among two others I deem worthy…”_

He nearly crashed into the ornate wooden door, but then he jiggled the lock, and out he went, escaping that corridor of hell.

_“…I choose to keep you alive.”_

But as he locked the corridor behind him and dashed forward, he nearly stumbled out from the cliff.

Heart beating its panicked beats in his throat, he pressed his back against the door. Three steps forward and he’d have fallen to the great oblivion below.

It took him a moment to reorient his disoriented self.

He looked around, and found that there were three other doors that led to this place, and one huge door being guarded by a swinging mace. What kind of place was this? It looked like an empty, hollow chamber. Could this be the heart of the citadel? If it was, then what a surprise that it didn’t have a heart at all, because it contained nothing. Nothing but rocks, floating in the air as if the air was a river of water and the rocks were supposed to be the logs on the river one could hop and skip on to avoid whatever alligators lived below. Alligators. Well. He tried not to think about it as he reached back a paw and twisted at the knob, only to find that he couldn’t.

Because there was no knob.

Meaning he was locked here.

Alone.

Until the two of the three smaller doors opened, and out stumbled the Alpha and the Beta, panting just as much as he probably did when he first came here.

It took them a moment to reorient their disoriented selves. And when they finally looked up and saw him…

“Sarge?” they asked in unison.

—oOo—

Into the forest she went, deeper and deeper into its murky soul she tumbled. Along her way, the freshly green summer leaves crumpled and died and autumn fell around her as winter sucked the life of the night and turned the trees into dead skeletons. The sunless and moonless and starless sky hovered as a pitch black blanket overhead. Fog swirled beneath her feet as she ran, step after step after excruciating step, huffing as her lungs strained and her heart ached and her legs moved even though all her meagre body wanted was a minute to _breathe_. But she knew she couldn’t stop, she couldn’t—he was calling her and he needed help and she had to be there to _save_ him—

_“DULCINEA!”_

That way. Swiftly turning around, she scampered after the voice, neglecting to listen to that whisper of doubt on her ear muttering the fact that she _last_ heard the voice the _opposite_ way…the voice called again, but from another slightly different direction, so she turned that and banished any other useless thought, single-minded in her pursuit—only this time she tripped over her own bushy tail and nearly flattened her face against the ground if she hadn’t caught herself in time, a paw tightly gripping a low-hanging tree branch. She exhaled a single breath, relinquishing her hold. Then she gritted her teeth and fisted her paws on her silken skirt, not as much so she wouldn’t trip over the stupid fabric as to restrain her nigh uncontrollable violent need to severely _mutilate something_.

Only she stopped when she finally did reach what was supposed to be her destination.

And instead of the brief relief of having a second to spare to breathe, all that single, momentary pause did was snatch away what remained of the air in her lungs.

Puss in Boots. A small figure almost obscured by the fog if not for the vivid ginger fur that brought the single patch of colour in this monochromatic world. His entire front and a side of his face, flat against the dirt. One paw weakly reaching forward for his fallen sword.

His sword. Fallen.

She could feel her heart clenching in on itself.

_What. Happened._

Exhaling his name, she scurried over to him, vertiginous when tripping again over a rock and scraping her knees and her soft-padded paws when she caught herself on the stony ground. Beyond irritated of her bodily ineptitudes, she pushed herself off the floor and forced the bile down her throat, telling the dizziness that had seized her brain to scram because its bedevilling presence was. not. HELPING.

She reached him, sat beside him, and for a moment she panicked on what to do before deciding to shut it and just turn him over so she could see what on earth was wrong—

And oh boy did she get her answer.

He had no face.

No eyes. No nose. No mouth. And as she took hold of his paw…

No weight. No warmth. No pulse.

_No life._

She scrambled back up to her feet and the paw she’d held fell to the ground where it disappeared into little bits of weightless ashes that gained tiny wings and took flight, blinding her a moment when the white little creatures flew to her face and disappeared up into the black sky.

She’d shielded her face with her paws from the onslaught, but she didn’t have the desire to remove them even now that they were gone. She clenched her paws over her face and bowed her head as her breaths came in more shallowly than the last. 

Puss. Puss was gone, or hurt, or somewhere she didn’t know, and she was stuck in this place where there was no way out and whoever was playing her wanted to keep her _out of the real thing_ when all she wanted was _die_ if that’s what it took to—

Clap.

Clap.

Clap.

She froze in place.

They were slow. Crisp. Far in between. She could _hear_ the loud mocking condescension, each singular sound sharp and swift like blades thrown in the air, one palm striking the surface of another, again, again, again, again.

Her brain, it worked slowly.

Its rusted gears creaked in each painful turn.

But finally, she was able to process the fact that the claps were accompanied by leather soles scraping against the ground, one step, one, one, one slow step…after another.

Then.

Then they stopped.

She didn’t turn. Didn’t dare. Didn’t move.

Or was simply not able to.

“Oh, Dulcinea, Dulcinea, Dulci _nea_ ,” sang the imposter, each call of her name an exact mimicry of the pained screams that she so foolishly let misguide her earlier. His voice was exactly just like—like _his_ , but this time, she could plainly hear how each word dripped with the hot white lava of mockery, one painful drop after another searing what was left of the thin veil of mercy she had for this despicable rat.

She could feel it, the warm air breathing against her cheek as he stooped down to where she sat so he could whisper those terrible, terrible words into her ear.

“Rise and shine, my dear,” and his voice was back to that sinful timbre she’d always known and hated. Thick. Deep. Obnoxiously _sniffy_. She wanted to move and face him for the wretched scoundrel that he was, but she was frozen against her will. Left with no choice but to sit there and silently stew in her anger and fear.

Fear for the fact she could not control even herself.

And if she could not control even herself…

What, then, of everything else?

“Your ride arrives soon,” he continued to drawl, and she hated hated _hated_ to _hear_ him _smirking_ at her inner pain, this, this, this—this _incredibly bad person_ , who had _not_ the single most tiny iota of honour.

He seemed to make sure that he wetly clicked his tongue against the roof of his mouth before uttering his next words:

“Time for the princess to get her suffering little _hero_.”

And, finally, finally, as if those were the magic words, she finally bolted awake, one scream exploding out her mouth.

_“PUSS!”_

—oOo—

She sat.

And for a moment, as she stared blankly ahead, disoriented and breathing heavily, there was nothing but silence.

Then…

Then an echo. Once.

Twice.

Thrice.

—oOo—

Many have tried. All of them failed.

The Forbidden Citadel was built millennia ago by the Great Mage in order to imprison what he thought was evil incarnate.

The world, being the globe and den of evil creatures that it is, either tried to forget or validate its existence. Some shrouded the Citadel in myth. Others embarked on journeys from faraway lands to prove its truth, even after having been called mad by their fellow villagers or driven away from their village _because_ of their mad rambles of ambition.

But they weren’t mad. At least, that’s what they’d insist. They’d insist it was their life’s calling. That something within them _spoke_ to them. That they were destined for greatness. They were promised power, armies, the world. Only if they went to the Citadel first.

Of course, those mad people who believed they weren’t mad were the ones mad enough _not_ to realize their own madness.

They who went on their journeys never did return.

Some wondered if they got sidetracked from their goals. Maybe they got lost. Maybe someone spotted them wandering aimlessly and speaking madly to themselves and were sent to a local asylum. Maybe they found a new town to live in, a town welcoming enough that diluted their madness.

Or maybe it was something else.

Maybe they _did_ succeed in reaching the Citadel.

Only that the Citadel swallowed them whole.

Which was, as the Red Sheevra could testify herself, the actual truth.

She was a faerie. A demon faerie, some would call her. That would be grossly inaccurate, though. She was not a demon. She was not a spawn of hell. She was a _Sheevra_ , a daughter of magic. Sheevras were forms of faeries, mischievous like pixies, but ones who specifically have power over memory. There were various kinds of Sheevras. Blue Sheevras had the uncanny ability to erase and change memories at will. Red Sheevras could access memories and use one’s greatest nightmares—or dreams—against them. There were also Yellow, Orange, Green, and Violet Sheevras, but those are rare, if Sheevras themselves weren’t already rare.

As it was, she was simply called the Red Sheevra. That’s because the first thing humans judged about creatures who did not look like themselves were the colour of their skin. And since human culture depicted demons with _red_ skin, well what else could you expect from those dull apes who learned how to walk upright and thought it made them the wisest creatures ever made by Creation.

She was a nameless creature. No parent had been obligated to name her because she was not conceived from any creature’s womb. No, she was born from the blood sacrifice of a thousand cacti and a thousand grains of desert sand, summoned as the harp sung a thousand arpeggios under a thousand glittering stars. She and her sister had been brought into existence this way, summoned by desperate magical practitioners kidnapped by mercenaries. The sisters were then given to these mercenaries who had kidnapped their summoners in the first place for that very reason. The sisters were then used and abused as slaves for generations to do the mercenaries’ bidding. Killing, manipulating, torturing people. It drove her mad. It should drive _anybody_ mad, which was why the Red Sheevra admired her younger sister for her ability to keep it together.

And that was when she decided she’d do most of the work the mercenaries commanded them to do. Killing. Manipulating. Torturing. At the cost of her sanity, the Red Sheevra got all the dirty jobs done, to protect her sister from the kind of black darkness only doing evil would bring.

Their lives continued this way for maybe a thousand more years until the Great Mage Sino rescued them and offered them something else. Something better than the life of misery they already led.

He crowned her twin, the Blue Sheevra, as the Tiny Queen of the Netherworld. She was assigned to keep the society of banished underworld creatures at bay, to keep them safe from the ridicule and judgment of the outside world. She was to keep the secrets of the Ancient Prophecy safe through a series of writings divined to her by the Great Mage, then pass the word down through the Zephilim who wholeheartedly pledged their loyalty to her throne.

On the other hand, she, the Red Sheevra, had been given the role of guarding the Forbidden Citadel until such a time comes that someone worthy arrives to retrieve its eternal prisoner.

If they weren’t worthy, then she erased them from existence.

It’s not that she took pleasure out of killing. An entire lifetime ago, she was forced to do it every single day. But she’d grown out of it. She realized that sometimes it was necessary to step down from one’s high pedestal of morality for the sake of everyone else. Contrary to popular belief, the Red Sheevra wasn’t evil. In fact, she _detested_ evil. And every single mortal who had dared challenge the Citadel were _villains_. After all, what villain wouldn’t _like_ to have Evil Incarnate by his—or her—right hand the moment they step up the throne to dominate the world? Mortals who visited the Citadel were usually up to no good. Or worse, summoned here by the Evil One himself. They had hearts stained so black they no longer deserved to see the light of day. So what she did was simply snuff their lives out. If they destroyed more lives if she let them out alive, then it would be on her hands for not doing what she needed to do.

It was far better than her previous life of gratuitous blood and screaming. But guarding a citadel wasn’t much fun either. Some days, she’d feel a touch of envy, because while she sat there and watched the same boring weather century by century, her sister was a queen.

When she was nothing but a guard.

But that was okay. It was gruesome, killing trespassers. Her sister was pure and good. If she had to stain herself to keep it that way, then so be it.

And while she was staining herself, better do it with a liiiiittle bit of mischief, yeah?

“Come on!” she said. Or, _he_ said? She had transformed herself into a male wolf. The one they called Beta, or the one who called himself Olvid. She didn’t make the effort to understand why he had two names. Silly mortals and their obsession with labels.

“There’s the heart of the citadel,” she continued, pointing a claw to the direction of the metal gate, a mace swinging back and forth and back and forth, guarding it. “We should get to it.”

Alpha and Sarge looked at each other. Then exchanged nods.

Good. No suspicions yet.

They jumped, then landed on the floating rocks nearest to them. They leapt and leapt—Sarge landed on a rock booby trapped by falling spikes, but unfortunately, nothing impaled him. Flexible bastard.

“Hey, Beta!” said Sarge, who had finally landed on the largest rock of them all, the rock nearest the gate. She rolled her eyes. Then faked a jump—actually gliding a little—when she landed beside the young mortal. “Nice,” Sarge commented, quite unnecessarily. She arched a brow at him. Then Sarge cleared his throat and waved his arms up for the Alpha to see. “Over here, A-boss!”

A-boss? That’s odd. From what she glimpsed of their memories, he was called Alpha, not A-boss. She dug deeper into their memories. Then, quite unintentionally, she found out that the Alpha’s true name was…

Eh?

What the hell?

“AAHHH!” screamed the Alpha, interrupting her thoughts. The floating rock they were on tilted a little to the side, following the Alpha’s weight. She cursed under her breath. The Alpha was hanging on the side of the rock. What utter incompetence. Sarge went to help him up. Oh well, guess she should help too.

Once they’ve helped him up, she got to business.

“Alright, listen up,” she said, her male voice gravelly. “That swingin’ mace? It’s gonna kill us if we don’t do this _carefully_.” Classic. “It’s swingin’ two times a second, which means we got ‘alf a second before someone gets ta the other side ta the gate withou’ gettin’ killed.” She hated it when she had to eliminate letters from her words whenever she had to imitate someone else’s manner of speaking. Mortals were lazy, even when they spoke. They were as lazy as a bunch of barnacles.

The Alpha was looking at her blankly as if she didn’t just say the most intelligent words he’d ever hear his entire life. Dumb dog.

“’Ey, Teddy!” she said to shake him out of his mortal dumbness. “You listenin’ to me?!”

Teddy—the Alpha—snapped at that. “What?”

Sarge burst out laughing. “Your real name’s _Teddy?_ ”

“I—I—“ He was probably blushing under his fur. “OLVID!”

Good, she had his attention. “Look, do you want to get this job done or not?!”

They were both silent.

She sighed. “I thought so. Now then, Alpha,” she said, refocusing on the swinging mace, “Since I’m obviously the only one of the three of us capable of thinking, I’ll do the signal. On my count of three, you’d jump so you could get to the other side. Got it?”

The Alpha rolled his eyes. “Since when’re you the boss?” he asked, but he crouched, ready to sprint on her command. Perfect. Perfect idiot.

“One,” she said, pretending to look like she knew what she was doing.

“Two.” The Alpha crouched even more, his game face on.

She hid a grin.

“Three— _JUMP!_ ”

And the Alpha sprinted. But just as she thought he was about to leap into the air and get smashed by the swinging mace just as she’d planned—

She felt his arms locking around her waist and they both fell down into oblivion.

Oh, for the love of the Citadel. Her jig was up. They’re no fun.

She transformed into her Sheevra self, the wings on her back lifting the both of them back into the air. She tried to wrestle the clinging pest off of her.

_“How did you know it was me?!”_

“Ha!” harrumphed the Alpha as he whizzed through the air, Sarge whooping in triumph from the background. “The Beta _never_ remembers anyone’s names! Also, he’s not that smart to count to three.”

“HEY!” One of the unopened wooden doors opened, revealing the _real_ Beta, still panting from whatever high-speed running he had to do probably from some dark creature of his nightmare. “I’ll getcha fer that, Boss!”

“I’d like ta see you try—ooph!“ She’d kicked the Alpha in the nuts. The Alpha yelped and rolled back down across the surface of the rock.

“BOSS!” Sarge said.

“You,” growled the Beta. She swivelled her head to the side to lock eyes with the angry furry.

Ooh, she’s shaking in fear.

He lifted two fisted paws.

_“GYAAARGH!”_

Smirking, she smoothly dodged his attack. He landed on a rock, groaning. She laughed like a demon at the sight of his butt arched up into the air.

The Alpha burst out laughing at the sight, too, but Sarge had to elbow him in the gut to silence him. As a result of getting elbowed, though, the Alpha’s laugh got stuck in his throat and he choked.

Sarge looked like he was in agony, trying to restrain his own laugh. 

She doubled over in laughter.

These lads, they weren’t evil. They weren’t here because of some evil voice whispering at the back of their brains, if they even had brains. Their hearts, they weren’t black. She could feel it, their humour and bond and the intensity of their loyalty. They weren’t intelligent, sure. Their lack of ambition could be quite disgusting to some. Their only goal in life was to propagate their kind, simply survive with their loved ones. Have enough food and fun. They’re all idiots. It didn’t make them worthy.

But it didn’t make them not worthy either.

And there wasn’t anything in the rules that said she _wasn’t_ supposed to open the door to those who landed right on the middle of the worthy - not worthy spectrum.

This was a sign. She knew it. She’d been waiting for this moment her entire life. She could feel her job finally coming to an end, the prophecy being fulfilled. Any moment now she’d be by her sister’s side again.

But before all that…

“STOP LAUGHIN’ AT US!!” the Beta and the Alpha said in unison, and Sarge had to transform his giggles to coughs if he wanted to keep his head attached on his furry neck.

She curled her lips into a smile.

She’d have some fun with these blokes first.

—oOo—

She blinked her eyes, though weirdly enough she didn’t feel like they were bleary or sleepy or heavy. In fact, she felt lucid, like she’d been awake this whole time. But she _had_ fallen asleep, probably with her body curled up against the cold stone of the only boulder in the vast expanse of the Western Desert. At least that was what she assumed when she blankly turned around and dully realized that she had woken up probably from the pillow she’d made of a crevice from the boulder.

The Western Desert at night. The sky was bloodily black. The bonfire, which she remembered they’d lit a while ago, was now nothing but ash and coal, the remaining embers crawling across the last, tiniest burnable surfaces of the wood as hot orange glows.

A small gust of wind blew in her direction, stirring up white ash from the bonfire and making them soar past her then up in the heavens. Her paws instinctively crossed over her chest and reached up to rub at her upper arms. Chilly.

But then.

Then she looked down beside her.

A rose.

A…rose?

Her heart thumped.

She stood, looked around, frantic.

Fear.

_Where._

Her heart thumped from fear.

_Where was Puss._

Fear of the unknown.

_Where was Puss?!_

She cursed under her breath. Possibly a thousand fiddlefuffs in five seconds flat. Her fingers curling, her eyes welling, her brain pounding against the inside of her skull as blood raged from within her and her mind stormed with unwanted thoughts.

Fiddlefuff.

_Fiddlefuff._

Even Babieca wasn’t here.

Meaning he took him so that he could run far, far away, with the fullest intention to _leave her here alone._

She pretended that the abandonment didn’t hurt. Or maybe it was the fact that her heart, having known nothing but purity and happiness and innocence all her life, lacked the ability to recognize that the strange foreign feeling invading her system right now was actually pain.

He left her.

How could he.

How could he leave?

_How could he just—!_

After frantically circling a small portion of the area she was in and realizing that for thousands of miles across there was no one else here _but_ her, she scrambled back down to where she’d slept and knelt before the rose, slipping both paws underneath its long green thorny stem before gripping them tightly with her fingers, bowing her head and curling into herself and gritting her teeth and glaring with blue eyes blanketed by a sheet of tears that continued to thicken by the second at the vivid red petals of this one stupid _stupid_ flower.

A rose. Seriously.

She further curled into herself and let the tears fall, damp dark violet blots staining her silken dress’ light lavender shade.

Of course, he just _had_ to leave behind a bloody rose like the dramatic showman that he was, as if it was the last thing he’d ever—

Last thing he’d ever—

She choked out a sob. A wet mirthless laugh was embedded in it.

So then, so then if that were the case, if he thought this rose was the last thing he’d ever say to her because going back in time CLEARLY meant that he had no intention of EVER going back again, then, then what?

Then what _did_ he mean to say?

‘I’m sorry?’ ‘Goodbye?’

‘Nice meeting you so now I’ll have to leave you forever?’

_Puss._

_Puss, you stupid idiot of a hero._

_You stupid dramatic IDIOTIC HERO!_

She thought she’d just convinced him out of this. Of his borderline idiotic plan of turning back time so this—so they—so nothing, _nothing_ ever happened, erasing all the good things they had built together over the past several months since they’ve met, because Puss being the idiot he was was utterly convinced that that was the only way to fix this when it wasn’t! IT WASN’T! There was another way, there _was_ , and they’d just talked about it, she could remember it, remember that earlier conversation with him before he ultimately collapsed to the sand—or was that just a play to trick her into falling asleep beside him too, so he could execute this stupid plan of his later? She remembered it, convincing him to seek out the Great Mage Sino in the morning so they could fix this mess once and for all _together_.

Together.

What part of _together_ was he struggling with?

She didn’t know how long it was that she stayed curled up in herself like that, knelt onto the dusty desert ground with her paws tightly gripping the rose, wind blowing and the stars above shifting while her wide blue eyes continued to brim with tears that she didn’t care clouded her vision, that she had too much of a shock to bother blinking away.

She should be getting back to San Lorenzo and attempt to stop him.

But when she forced herself up, stood, her legs felt like lead. She stared ahead, at the infinite expanse of desert that separated her from wherever Puss was.

What did she hope to accomplish? She couldn’t even possibly get there in time.

She had no fighting chance.

At least, that was what she was thinking until she noticed a white thing galloping in her direction.

The white patch grew and grew as it rapidly closed the distance, and when Dulcinea finally blinked her tears away and wiped them off with the furry heels of her paws, she could discern the shape of a horse, each powerful thump of its hooves against the cloudy desert sand beneath it becoming solider and solider a sound to her ears as he came ever closer.

She felt her heart burst and she surged forward to meet him.

_“Babieca!”_

Finally. Finally, one thing, one single thing in this life going her way. Now all she’d have to do was ride back to San Lorenzo as fast as they could and stop Puss—stop Puss _first_ , she can’t risk him going back in time and have him destroy everything they built together, just no, she hated herself for thinking this way but right now she was going to be selfish for once and all that mattered to her was _Puss came first_ —then, then came second, come what may, save her town.

At least, that was what she was thinking before noticing the distressed expression on Babieca’s face as the four-legged equine came up to her.

“Babieca!” worry contorted her words as she wildly reached out and attempted to calm the stallion down—because once he reached her, he’d begun throwing his head back, his mane violently following his motions, neighing to the direction from whence he came, his beady black eyes wide and gleaming and screaming with a message. She was able to calm Puss’ stallion down eventually, but not without a lot of effort expended on her behalf.

“Hush, Babiebca, hush,” she finally said once he settled down, both mammals breathing heavily. She made certain to gently yet firmly touch the sides of his face.

Then gravely, she asked.

“What happened?”

And there was only one way he could respond. Unfortunately, she couldn’t speak horse. Suddenly she wished that they never had to leave behind what they momentarily had in the Netherworld.

Frustrated, Babieca shook Dulcinea’s paws off his face and walked over to some other area where he could freely begin to move his hoof over the ground. Dulcinea couldn’t see what he was doing when it was his tailed arse that faced her, so, hesitantly, she walked over to him to see what he was doing. And he was…writing?

 _Drawing._ A hastily scrawled sketch of a cat garbed with a plumed hat, a belt, and a pair of boots with circles as eyes tangential to acutely angled eyebrows stared back at her. Who Babieca was trying to sketching was unquestionable.

“Puss in Boots…” she muttered. Looking up at the stallion, “Puss sent you here?”

Babieca let out a snort and began to draw something else beside the cartoony drawing of the cat.

A curved broadsword.

“Scimitar,” she ventured.

Her eyes roamed between the two figures.

Then her pupils shrank into slits when she realized what that meant.

“Y-you mean…you mean Evil Puss.”

She clenched her paws into fists, and they trembled with fury.

She could almost hear his mocking laugh.

_…You NEVER learn, do you?_

Babieca fiercely nodded.

 “Evil Puss,” she drawled, “he sent you here to get me.”

Of course. It didn’t make sense, that after leaving her here probably thinking he was being chivalrous at keeping her away from the heart of danger, Puss would send Babieca right back to retrieve her. No. It made more sense for Evil Puss to do it, probably right after catching Puss and Babieca in the middle of their plot, and sent the latter back to retrieve her so she’d be caught right in the middle of whatever mad perverted scheme he’d come up with to make their life even more of the living hell it already was.

She was relieved that Evil Puss probably did her job for her. That he stopped Puss from doing whatever stupid thing he wanted to do. She was relieved.

And right after the relief came a huge nauseating wave of _guilt_.

Because the longer this skirmish went on, the longer Puss delayed from doing what was right, (if it even _was_ right, but what _WAS_ right?) another eternity was spent by the other San Lorenzans imprisoned in the Treasure House.

With a flash of memory, suddenly she felt his voice, soft as sin, whisper in her ear.

_Your ride arrives soon._

_Time for the princess to save her suffering little…_

Her stomach twisted and she felt like vomiting.

A fresh wave of tears knocked her down to her knees again, and she used one paw to stifle the sob from erupting in her mouth.

But this time the tears weren’t of sorrow.

They were of anger.

Evil Puss was playing _with_ her. Playing _her_. Like she was his some sort of…

Suddenly, as she looked up at Babieca, who’d been trying to tell her that he was sent here by Evil Puss, the notion didn’t seem so farfetched.

As the Blind King of the Netherworld, Evil Puss briefly had the ability to control the Netherworldians and made an army out of them—beginning with manipulating the Tiny Queen to spy upon San Lorenzo for him as Lil Pequeña. He controlled his minions via magical metal bands wrapped around their wrists—or ankles, as she briefly remembered Shiela the dingo dancer who must’ve been under his control when she arrived at the town suspicious and shady and left it amiable and good-humoured. He used the metal bands as his strings to his victims’ minds, warping their thoughts so they were his to control. He’d only been defeated when Puss took off the metal band from Lil Pequeña, thus revealing her to be the Tiny Queen, liberating her from his control and then finally utterly destroying him upon her command that K'fhoggnarh stomp him to oblivion.

Now that he was out of the Netherworld, he must’ve already lost all of his powers—his all-seeingness and his mind manipulation abilities—just as she has lost her superstrength and Babieca his ability to speak and so on and forth. The mystery now was how he was able to _retain_ his mind manipulation abilities…with the dangerous advantage of not needing to strap metal bands upon his victims in order to do so.

Babieca worriedly stooped his head down to her and nudged her out the dark swirl of her thoughts. Dulcinea looked up to stallion.

But then…then what? What did this new realization bring her? Probably despair, and wouldn’t Evil Puss want that? It brought her nothing _but_ , when that was the last thing she needed.

And she needed to be hopeful.

She stood up again, determined not to crumble and give Evil Puss the satisfaction.

She gripped at the rose.

With her other paw, she reached out for Puss’ stallion.

“Babieca,” she whispered, her sweet voice made hoarse, “please take me to him.”

And as they galloped all the way back to San Lorenzo, without a plan or an army or a great mage and having no one else but her same old self, she knew that one thing was for sure.

She had awoken from a nightmare only to find herself in a worse one.

And for all she knew, even _this_ was under his control.

—oOo—

She examined her nails—not as pristine as she first had them two thousand years ago, but she didn’t exactly have the time to leave her guard post and hire a manicurist.

The wolves huddled together, all posed for another round of tag.

Unfortunately, she wasn’t having fun anymore.

She really was just tired already.

“Is this _all_ you can do?” the Red Sheevra taunted, her voice raspy and leathery yet brimming with power. She sighed. “Why are you so determined to kill me, when you very well know I, an immortal, could obliterate you like toothpicks with a snap of my fingers? You do know by now that I am only playing, do you not? Because if so, I have clearly overestimated your cerebral capacities, and I apologize for my shortcoming if that is the case.”

“…You killed our brothers,” one of them said, a simple reply to her sass. What? That’s it, nothing else? A pity. After all those words she’d put the effort to string together. To be fair though, he was panting, his lip busted and blood coating a couple of his canine fangs, and that was her fault, because she was flying around and he was chasing her, and he accidentally bumped his nose against a rock because she dodged. She should be sorry.

She was.

“You have to die,” one of them continued, his condition just the same as the one who had just spoken.

“Yeah,” the last one of them agreed.

She wasn’t even keeping track of who was who anymore. All three of them looked—and sounded—so similarly. Nope, she wouldn’t doubt it at all if they told her they actually _were_ biological brothers, even if, when she invaded the closet of their memories, she knew for a fact that they were not even related by blood.

“Hmm,” she droned. She had to die, eh? Because she killed their brothers? Interesting. Her wings flapping softly a hundred times a second, she floated above them, circling them like prey. She smelled their anger, their frustration, their anxiety, their…body odour, but there was something else. Something stronger. Yes, even than their body odour. What was this? What reigned in their hearts?

Their desire for vengeance, or loyalty?

Their urge for destruction, or love?

Since they already failed her tests of intelligence, she had to find out if their worth lied somewhere else. If not in their intellect, did it lie in their hearts?

But their hearts, they were black.

However, where did the black on their hearts come from?

Did it come from the rot within?

Or was it merely a façade, a coating painted there by someone else, by an outside force?

She looked at them. Their fur was mangled, dirt and twigs clinging to them from the long journey they’d undertaken just to get here. Their blood, splattered on the rocks. They were tired and panting, yet such ferocity gleamed back at her from their black eyes.

She regretted that she had to hurt them, physically and emotionally. But such things were necessary when the grand unveiling of fate dangled by the thin thread of her whims. Besides, it’s not like she was trying to kill them. She was trying to make sure that they were worthy of laying their eyes upon her Evil Prisoner, just as the Great Mage had instructed her. The slightest error in her judgment could mean not the fulfilment of the prophecy, but the end of the world.

‘Guard the Citadel until the time comes,’ were the exact words the Great Mage had told her, a long time ago when he first built the tower, summoning it from the earth below. But she didn’t understand, so she asked what he meant:

_But when would the time come?_

‘The time comes when the worthy ones appear at the gate,’ the Great Mage answered, as if that should clarify everything. But, still she did not understand, so again, she asked what he meant:

_How do I know the worthy ones?_

‘You’d know they are worthy once you see yourself in them,’ the Great Mage answered, and she was stunned into silence, because did that mean _she_ was worthy? She? She almost blurted out that he’s probably mental—she did a lot of horrible things in her past, she couldn’t possibly be worthy. But then he said:

_I see your heart. And I see its worth._

_Love._

_You killed and manipulated and tortured, but you did that out of love._

_For your sister._

“What if…” She let the proposition hang in the air. The three wolves’ breaths caught in their throat—just the reaction she had wanted to extract. She paused from her drift through the air, and stopped. Looked at them.

“What if I told you they’re still alive?”

Their eyes widened.

No one spoke for a moment.

“Dess,” one of them eventually broke the silence. “And Fang, and Alrys, and—all of them. Still alive?”

 _Ooh._ Curiouser and curiouser. The Beta was laying himself emotionally vulnerable, saying their names as if this were the last time he could ever have the chance to do so. She wondered if he thought she really did kill them. She rummaged through his thoughts, invading the part of his brain where his subconscious thoughts and fears bubbled and gurgled like a pot of green witchy slop.

Yep. He thought she really did kill them. He thought they really were dead.

Poor sap.

“Indeed,” she confirmed. “They’re all alive. And you can have them all back. If,” she sharply interjected before anyone burst into any tears of joy.

“ _If_ you turn your backs now. If you vow never again to return. If you betray your loyalty to your Master…in exchange for all of your brothers.”

She should be shocked, she decided, when she detected no ounce of hesitation in their voice when of them firmly said:

“Then bring them back and we will _never_ disturb your peace again.”

But, they were words, they were merely words. Words were easy to twist. Words were the foundations of stories. Words were the media of lies.

“You have to prove your honesty,” she told the wolves. “One of you shall die here by someone’s paw. Only the two of you shall get out of this chamber alive.”

“That…is not…that’s not—that’s not _fair!_ ” one of them wailed.

“I have all the cards here,” she pointed out. “So it’s my deal. Kill one of you three, and I will believe that once I give you the rest of your brothers, you will never invade my abode again. So who would do it?”

“…I’d do it.”

The Beta and Sarge’s heads swivelled to look at the Alpha.

Then they took a step back away from him.

“You…can’t be serious.”

“You ain’t killin’ one of us for this, are ya boss?”

“Not even a little bit of hesitation?”

The Alpha unsheathed his claws. His brothers took their steps back. Her condition was only two of them shall remain alive. Who will the Alpha kill? Who will he kill?

He took a step forward. Then another. And another. Towards…

He lifted his eyes.

“Both of you name one of your children after me.”

Then he struck himself in the heart.

—oOo—

He bit down on his lip, resisting the urge to cry out when the wolves binding his wrists from behind him tightened that scratchy rope a little _too_ harshly for his taste.

His right wrist was still sore. 

Once the wolves finished their job, they flanked themselves at his sides, making him at the centre of their formation. Puss nearly scoffed, except he stopped himself when he tasted metal in his tongue and decided against worsening the situation from the travesty it already was. The wolves, flanked at his sides. How tacky. He assumed that the dogs were ordered to stand guard and wait for the arrival of their master before anything proceeded. Really, all this was so needlessly dramatic. If he were in a better situation, he would’ve rolled his eyes with all his might. But the situation was he was _tied to a goddamn stake_ and that was nothing you rolled your eyes about. Like he was about to be damned to the flames by an inquisition for heresy. He had suffered several beatings on the tortuous climb up here and then another more when he resisted from being tied up the stake like some sort of worm. He’d laughed when he’d attempted a clumsy punch at a wolf only to be sucked in the gut. This, this was his Calvary, only unlike Hesús himself he was to suffer and die for his own sins and no one else’s, and there was no ultimate purpose to his suffering nor was there any powerful deity who watched upon him. Felina had forsaken him, he should be dead by all accounts—a cat against a wolf was a fight against a Goliath, what more of _fifteen_ of them? In a matter of skill Puss would always win, but the simple matter was that they overpowered him.

However, they must’ve been ordered to keep him alive. It was a testament to his fading will, how he wasn’t certain if _being alive_ was something he should even be happy about. Because now all he could feel was his entire body aching everywhere, even in cracks he never even knew existed. He was still armed—the silver cup of his sword still rested on its rightful perch on his belt—but the only reason they probably didn’t even attempt to unarm him was because he was not even an enemy _worth_ disarming. Probably the same reason why they let him keep his hat. Or maybe it really was in their intention for this to be a parody of the Passion, and his hat was to be his Crown of Thorns. Ha. Ha. He never would have thought his tasteless interdimensional twin to be into poetic symbolism.

It would be nice, the sentiment came to him as an afterthought, if he was granted even the basic feeling of security of having a firm ground to stand upon. But even that had been stripped away from him, made to feel even more vulnerable by distancing his boots a foot or two from the floor.

It was utterly humiliating.

He bowed his head, taking advantage of the dark shadows the long sweep of his hat provided him.

And underneath the shade, he uttered one last prayer, one last prayer to whatever being who can hear him if one even existed in the first place, even going so far as promising to willingly take a thousand infinite lashes upon his back in Hell, if they would just heed his one last wish.

“Please do not let Dulcinea come for me.”

She was the first person in a long time in his nine lives to make him feel again what it was like, to have to protect someone _worth_ protecting.

But now, now he was tied up on a stake.

He could have laughed.

How dare call himself her protector?

 _How dare he_ , when all this time he had been absolutely nothing, not a saviour nor a hero nor some sort of a promised messiah nor the town protector he had always prided himself to be, absolutely nothing _but_ a laughable clown?

A new presence filtered in his senses.

“…can you repeat what you just said for me?”

He did not need to turn his head up to see who it was who had spoken.

Puss felt his fists tightening on their own accord, as if they weren’t already tightened by the binds.

He could see from his peripheral vision that the wolves that had flanked his sides were already filing out of sight. Perhaps Evil Puss had commanded that they make themselves scarce.

Huh. Good. A one-on-one. He was starting to doubt his evil alternate even had the tiniest shred of masculinity.

Once all wolves were finally out of earshot, he resumed his drawl.

“Puss in Boots.” The leather instep of Evil Puss’ came into his line of sight. “I believe I told you to repeat something for me.”

Ha. Unfortunately for him, Puss was a natural rebel. Staying silent was the only thing left he had on his list of options to keep up his inner rebel, so.

So that was exactly what he did.

Apparently, Evil Puss did not like rebels. Because all of a sudden he could feel a thick cold metal being thrust up his neck, forcing his head to stare up at the blood-stained heavens. Puss almost choked at the suddenness of the motion.

“How about now?” Evil Puss growled from underneath him.

“I…suggest you just do as he says, Cat in Shoes,” the Scimitar whispered to him lowly, his cold blade sharp upon his up-tilted chin. “Believe me, that course of action would be easier not only for him but for everyone else present. As much as I crave your blood…” The Scimitar made a shuddering sound. “It’s no fun if my wielder is out of _my_ control.”

Puss did not even hesitate from releasing that scoff this time. As if he would listen to the laments of a bloodthirsty sword.

It was difficult, with the sharp curved side of a sword being thrust up his neck and his heart beating its frantic, primal scream for survival, but Puss moved his eyes down so he met his clone’s angry green ones, then mustered up a smirk himself.

“How about you release me,” he whispered, because that was all he could manage with the pitiful rasp his voice had become, “so I could defend myself _properly?_ ”

Evil Puss thought for a moment, not relinquishing the Scimitar from his neck.

“You’re a noble cat, Puss in Boots,” he finally answered. “That’s the difference between the two of us. I don’t have your weakness. I don’t have a _code_. Meaning I do whatever the hell I want.”

He finally relinquished the Scimitar from his neck. Puss let out a gasp as his head fell forward, and he was certain that if he was not bound tightly enough to this ridiculous stake, the weak, flabby thing he called his body would have already splattered into a disgusting pile of flesh and blood onto the floor.

“You honourless filth,” he spat breathlessly, his eyes screaming red.

“Perhaps. Doesn’t change the fact that between the two of us, it’s you who’s tied to a stake. And it is I…” He stared up, looking so insufferably smug, “…who is having so. much. _fun_.”

Puss endeavoured to keep the expression on his face straight, but it was difficult.

It was _difficult_.

“There is no end to your twistedness.” He did not like how his voice trembled. This man—this _monster_ —had something in store, not only for him but for those he held precious. But he didn’t care what he did to him.

All he feared was what he would do to…

Evil Puss burst out laughing. “No end indeed!” He stepped back, twirling the Scimitar in his paw. Then he tilted his head up to relish the sight of Puss in Boots, tied to a stake, beaten to a pulp. “You don’t know how that eternity waiting for this moment has driven me MAD!” he raged. His fists trembled feverishly. A true madman. “But now, my vengeance, Puss in Boots—my vengeance is AT HAND. Soon my quest _ends_ , I can see it, finally I can _see it_ , soon I shall acquire the crowning glory to all the empires I have acquired from all thirteen worlds—and you, Puss in Boots…”

The villain glared at him. There was a wrong and terrible and manic glow in his eyes.

“I will make you _suffer_ through the same fate I had.”

“You are beyond reason,” Puss said. “I am your target and I alone. Why bring thirteen worlds into your warpath? How did you even manage to jump from world to world in the first place?”

“Duh, dark arts,” the Scimitar chimed in.

“Dark arts…?” Puss’ eyes narrowed. “Since when have you—“

“Since none of your business,” he snapped, irises and pupils shrunk to dots to let the whites of his eyes occupy the most area of his eyeballs. “I am the Evil One from the Ancient Prophecy, Puss in Boots, and you…you are the Chosen One.” He calmed down. “Honestly, I expected a lot more from you than this, but…” He sneered as he let his eyes run pervertedly across his interdimensional twin’s bound body. “I guess I can’t complain either.”

“You are wrong,” he shot back. “Dulcinea is—“

“Nononononono _no_ , you _idiot_ , she _isn’t_. You’ve read the prophecy, haven’t you? She had already fulfilled her role in the grand scheme of things by defeating the Bloodwolf. Which leaves _you_ as the Chosen One of the Ancient Prophecy, the one fated to pass the Zephilim’s legendary test of power they call the ‘Zoon-Zaree’—a boot-clad cat who has brought all this upon the mystic town of San Lorenzo, which I now claim as my Thirteenth Empire.  Why do you think I’m doing all this work to bring you to your knees before me, your Emperor-King? Somewhere along the way, it had stopped being _just_ about simple revenge. Now, if I destroy you…then I fulfil the end of the Evil One of the Ancient Prophecy. Making me the rightful holder of the Evil title. To rise to power…”

His voice had lowered, but his hostility has spiked.

“This is my _destiny_.”

Evil Puss continued to not make any sense.

“What _is_ it,” Puss said, “that I must say to get you to listen to me? _I_ am your _target_ , Evil Puss! It is I who you want! Kill me, if that is the sole thing left to satisfy you! _Me!_ Why involve anyone else along the way? Why involve _Dulcinea_ along the way?”

“Oh that’s easy. He’ll be punished if he doesn’t bring her here.”

Puss snapped his gaze back to the Scimitar.

“Punished,” he repeated dully.

Was there something else he was missing, some other shadow player he was not aware of?

He darkly turned his gaze back to Evil Puss.

“By whom,” he demanded.

“Shut it, Scimitar,” the wielder hissed at his weapon, before turning back to face his bound prisoner. “There is only one reason why I am involving her here, Puss in Boots. And that is because revenge will be sweeter the _bitterer_ you are against me.” The severe frown on his face stretched into a long, disturbing smirk.

“And the only way I can take that bitterness to an entire new level…is to take Dulcinea right here. In front of you.”

It took Puss several seconds before the full hidden meaning behind the words sunk in.

“…Shame on you,” he finally managed to ground out, and the whispered words were fragile upon his trembling tongue. “Shame on you, Evil Puss.”

“Shame on me, shame on me…oh? Why did you stop? Go on, repressed anger is not the healthiest—”

“SHAME ON YOU!” Puss cut off, spit flying out of his mouth as he screamed it. “GO TO HELL! YOU TWISTED DEGENERATE! SHAME ON YOU!”

And again it happened, Puss in Boots screaming and screaming and thrashing against his binds, throwing out every jeer and insult and spitting out his spite in bouts of blazing anger  because that was all he was left to do.

Once Puss was exhausted of insults to hurl, Evil Puss looked up from examining his claws and smirked.

“…Are you quite done? I bet screaming like you’re about to be gutted can get _tiring_.”

“Dulcinea.” Puss predatorily gritted his teeth as he stared down at his clone. His green eyes were bloodshot. “She will not come here. She will _not_ , for I have made sure to keep her from following me, and she, she will be safe, this I swear, she _will_ be safe from your dirty—”

“Oh, _believe me_ ,” Evil Puss interrupted, too gleeful in such a grim situation for any creature to consider normal behaviour. He struck the Scimitar’s blade to the ground, and made a scraping sound like claws against chalkmade, making Puss wince harshly as he moved it around himself to…draw something. “She’s _already_ on her way here. May take her some time, but we have aaaaaall night to wait! I told her to come, by the way, and of course she _will_ come, because you are _such_ good bait, oh yes you _are_.”

His heart sank. “It…no. It will take her days before she—”

“Not unless I sent Babieca after her.”

“…no. No.” The defiance was weak, and Puss realized there were tears gathering in his vision.

He had failed. He had failed Dulcinea when he failed to save San Lorenzo, let this villain steal from him his one last hope of ever fixing his mess.

And now he shall fail her from his very basic duty of protecting her from degenerates like this who wanted to rob her of her purity.

He felt his insides shrivelling. His entire world, _crumbling_.

He was drained of his anger, and all that was left of him was a quiet despair.

“No,” he whispered, and a single drop fell to dampen the ground beneath him. Followed by another. And another.

He bowed his head.

All the shame was on himself.

“This…cannot…”

“Oh, but it _can_ ,” Evil Puss mused. He walked back, then let the Scimitar float beside him once he let go of his hilt, stepping away from the figure he’d drawn onto the ground while they were chatting away. “This is what Artephius instructed you to create, wasn’t it? A simple magical symbol that would allow you to go back in time using this…” In his paw, he held a small white thing. “…mercuric chalk of yours. All you’d have to do now is stand in the middle of the star symbol, draw a circle with the chalk, and voila. Time travel. What a magnificent magical artefact, wouldn’t you say?”

Puss dully stared down at the…magical figure…Evil Puss had drawn on the ground using the Scimitar. Yes…he remembered seeing this exact same symbol onto the scroll he’d found for Artephius earlier, who had informed him that the symbol was a fundamental part of the spell itself, else the mercuric chalk would have no effect in folding the fabric of time—at least, according _to_ the scroll. The figure was just right under his hovering feet. A triangle embedded into another inverted triangle, forming the elementary shape of a six-rayed star, a hexagon in the middle of the figure where the time traveller was supposed to stand as the spell worked its magic. A half-circle was drawn to connect the first three sides of the star together.

To complete the figure, the circle must be full.

“Why did you draw this,” he said.

“One reason.” Evil Puss shrugged, smiling nonchalantly. “And that is to make you feel how so utterly close you were to accomplishing your mission…only to so miserably fail at the very last second.”

He chucked the mercuric chalk from his paw to his direction. It landed from outside the circle of the figure he just drew, then rolled until it stopped right at the middle of the hexagon.

And as Puss, tied up as he was at the stake, could only feel something in his heart twist.

The only thing separating him from his own redemption was freeing himself from these ropes, stand on that hexagon just right beneath his feet, grab the chalk, complete the circle, let the spell work, travel back in time, accomplish the mission.

But he cannot even so much as move a finger, because he was weak, a clown, an utter failure.

He turned his head away.

—oOo—

He struck himself in the heart.

At least, that was what the Alpha remembered doing when he plunged his claws into his chest and ripped right through the delicate flesh so he could wrench that beating organ of life out of the veins and arteries attached to it that stubbornly kept it in its place.

So when he opened his eyes, and found out that his claws didn’t even touch a single fur on his chest, he was astonished to find that an outside force had prevented him from killing himself. A black energy had coated itself around his paw and stopped it from moving an inch closer.

He looked up and saw the Red Sheevra, her arm extended, that same black energy coating her own hand, up around her wrists.

He stared into her eyes and found not evil, not sarcasm, not laughter, but something else.

But what?

Wolves were crap at emotions. More so in reading body language. The only ‘words’ they knew of body language was ‘punch’, ‘kick’, ‘spit’, and the numerous other variations, mixtures, and derivations of the abovementioned.

So he had a hard time, trying to figure out the expression on her face. But eventually, he arrived at an answer:

She was looking at him in respect.

In…respect.

And he realized a moment later, that the reason, the reason he couldn’t identify it at first was—was because—because—

Because no one had ever looked at him or his brothers in respect before.

They were looked at as dogs, servants, savages. And somewhere along the way, they began to act like the monsters everyone thought they were— _believed_ they were the monsters everyone said they were.

But this Sheevra, someone they barely knew, someone who’d been torturing them this entire time…

“Why?” he asked, because that was the only word he could snatch out of the whirlwind of his thoughts. 

She answered his question with a question of her own.

“Would you do anything for your brothers?”

“Yes.”

“Do you love them?”

“Yes.”

“Would you commit the crime of betraying your Master to preserve this love?”

 _“Yes already!”_ he bellowed. “What is this for, what’re you tryin’ to—“

“What I am trying to say,” she interjected pointedly, “is that I see myself in you.”

The torches hung on the walls of the chamber dimmed, the friendly yellow-orange light going out, darkness and shadow replacing them. A chilly cold fell upon them like sheets of cold wind, but the sensation did not feel like a physical coldness.

It was the coldness of evil.

The three wolves huddled closer together as the Sheevra continued to rise up in the air, her voice growing in volume and magnitude and beginning to accumulate with the voices of a thousand other souls singing behind her words. 

“I tell you these words just as the Great Mage had told me them,” she said, her voice echoing heavily in the entire empty chamber. The moment the darkness was full, the walls lit up, from bottom upwards, with ancient runes and letters, ominous red light pouring out of the words they spelt, embedded as they were in stone.

Little did the wolves know that the words written there told a story, a prophecy so ancient they should be wondering how and when _they_ even became a part of something as monumentally huge as the end of the world.

“I see your heart. And I see their worth. I see they are _worthy_ , and that is why…”

The floating rocks fell from around them. The rock they stood on floated forward, and, at the single lift of her arm, a bridge emerged from the earth below to connect the rock to the enormous iron door—the door that truly led to the heart of the Citadel.

The door behind which contained the prisoner their Master told them to fetch.

“That is why, as entrusted upon me by the Great Mage many ancient years ago, I entrust upon you the Evil Incarnate, the Evil Invader, the Wicked Ventriloquist, the Mind Controller, the No More. The Evil One of the Ancient Prophecy.”

The mace swinging over the door evaporated into dust, as if it had been nothing but an illusion all along.

“I believe you will make good use of the Evil One rather than use him for your own selfish ends, unlike the thousands of other mortals that came before you. I believe in you, because you are worthy—just as the Great Mage believed in me, because he believed I was worthy.”

The wolves looked among each other.

“Go, fetch your prisoner,” she said. “My job here is done, so better get yours done as well. Your brothers are waiting for you outside.”

And she dissolved into the air like grains of sand, leaving the three clueless wolves nothing but a bridge that connected them to…

To what, exactly?

To whom?

Who _was_ this Evil One?

How the _hell_ did they get entangled right in the middle of this interdimensional good versus evil mess they never had anything to do with in the first place?

There was only one move they could take, and it was forward.

So they walked across the bridge, having no idea as to what lay beyond that door.

—oOo—

Babieca slowed his gait as they neared San Lorenzo, then stopped once they reached their destination.

Dulcinea looked up at the moon, a silver orb stark against its bloody backdrop which was as red as the rose she held in her paw. The blowing wind was the only sound in the reigning silence.

She closed her eyes, exhausted from the tears she’d shed on the long way here.

This hellish night never seemed to end.

She jumped from the stallion’s back and told him to stay. She walked, slow yet resolute, her heels making soft thumps against the sandy ground as she approached the entryway. She flicked a brief, passing glance over at the empty boulder where the Sphinx usually took her spot as she walked by it, but then immediately returned her attention to the stone arch in front of her.

Onward she went, then entered the town.

And as she did, passing by houses and stores, stepping up and up and up the cobblestone path spiralling up the town, she saw—or imagined?—shadows move out of the corner of her eye.

She turned her head, and she could’ve sworn the peeking shadows immediately snapped themselves back against the dark, unseen side of the walls to blend into the darkness.

She took a deep breath. One of her paws held the wooden green stem of the rose, but her brain was completely apathetic to the thorns.

She felt her heart beat in silent panic.

Shut her eyes close.

Then ran.

This place was too empty. Too quiet. She could even hear the _thunk thunk thunk_ of her heels echoing through the night. Her ragged breathing was the loudest noise her ears had ever heard that she swore the entire world could hear it. Panic gripped her heart as she ran as fast as she could as if someone were chasing her even if the trail she left behind her was completely deserted.

Evil Puss was not an utter idiot. He sent her here for a reason. He must have something planned. And she was vaguely aware that she was falling right into it like the utter fool she was.

She smiled bitterly to herself. That line. From the book. From her dream. Nightmare. Whatever it was.

So love made her a fool?

Fine.

Then she was the biggest one there ever was.

She didn’t have any other choice. There _was_ no _other_ choice. She couldn’t just turn her back now. Or, what, let that evil dirt have Puss under his non-existent mercy? She couldn’t.

She couldn’t.

She entered the town’s main plaza a shaking mess. Her knees trembled and her chest heaved. She put her paws onto her knees as she felt her muscles turn to jelly. She could’ve collapsed right then and there and be content to just disappear.

If that would only undo everything.

She lifted her head, shaky breaths still puffing out her mouth. Then she ducked it again.

She couldn’t even look.

The fountain, ruined. The orphanage, burned. The cantina, devastated. The Treasure House, a prison. Owlberto, thrashed.

Owlberto…wait.

She lifted her head again, and this time she found her eyes locking their widening gaze onto Artephius’ alchemy and macramé owl shop—unable to turn away.

She’d caught a small flicker of candlelight inside.

Her brain raised a cacophony within, alarm bells screaming from the back of her mind.  She stubbornly pushed all the noise aside and put one thought at forefront of her mind:

_Puss._

She scampered over at the shop, ignoring the feeling of having a thousand eyes hidden from the shadows weighing her back.

If…if Puss had managed to get Artephius’ help…if Artephius even complied…if he really…then she…then she was…

 _Too late_ , continued her rebellious thoughts, but she would not let its destructive fire burn her hope.

She never needed it as badly as she did now.

She bounded up the steps that led to the shop. There was no door. As she took a step inside the dark shop, she heard something crack underneath her heel, and when she looked, she saw thousands of wooden splinters scattered across the floor. She looked back and observed that remnants of the door remained on its hinges, gently swinging back and forth perhaps in response to a gentle wind.

The doorway had been blasted to pieces.

But aside from that, the inside was already a mess. She didn’t need strong lighting to be able to tell. Shadows were long as the lone candle continued to flicker, its fiery life dangerously hanging on a thin thread, making the darkness seem like a moving entity enveloping the place. Books littered the floor. Liquids of different colours were spilled out of broken potion bottles, shards of glass glinting at her as she made her way forward with a sick stomach.  Scorched scrolls tumbled down the shelf and rolled onto the floor as if they sensed her movement when she stepped onto a weak spot onto the wooden floor, the creaking sound making her cringe. She retreated into herself and attempted to back onto the wall, but as a result she stumbled over a stray macramé owl, the rose slipping from her paw and falling to the floor, and before _she_ fell and crashed into another bookshelf and have all the potions stored there rain down on her as shattered glass, she caught herself when she clawed at the wooden workdesk nearby.

For a few moments, she didn’t move. She stayed there, frozen, four claws sunken into the wood, because otherwise she was _certain_ she’d have to collapse. She panted, staring at the floor with wide, blue eyes, a paw placed over her forehead as if that would calm her frayed nerves down.

What even _happened?_

She berated herself. Mentally slapped herself. Get. It. Together _._ She told herself to breathe, _breathe_ , because it would do no one good if she was reduced to a snivelling mess.

She had to get it together.

She’d been staring fiercely down at the floor as she went on her mental tirade. But then.

Then she noticed something.

The floor. The rose.

No. _No._

There was a thick liquid underneath, and its colour matched the rose’s…no.

She stumbled back in horror.

_No._

She accidentally hit the candle’s stem as she took a step back. And another. And another. The candle rolled over the smooth wooden surface and the fire on its wick went out in a thin swirl of smoke, plunging the place in darkness and shadow.

Just when she thought it had stopped, the candle rolled over the table some more and tumbled onto the ground.

It had to be potion. It had to be one of Artephius’ coloured potions.

Not…not…

She felt sick to her stomach.

She’d have to apologize to Artephius for those deep clawmarks she left on his mahogany workdesk. Until she had Evil Puss’ neck in her very paws, she was left with no choice but to make do with it.

Speaking of Artephius…

She’d turned her head to the side when she heard something—someone—shift, and her eyes widened as she registered who it was.

“Ar…tephius?”

Then it clicked.

_“Artephius!”_

And she launched herself at the old alchemist lying onto the floor, his old bearded face scrunching up and looking as if he were in pain. He most probably was.

“Artephius, Artephius!” She shook the man’s thin shoulders, willing him to open his eyes, to be okay, to _listen to her_. “You’re okay, Artephius, you’re alright, you’re, you’re—”

Artephius winced, still with his eyes closed, and she watched as the man lifted up an arm and placed a skeletal hand over his chest to grip at it.

She worriedly put her soft paws over his hand so she could see for herself what was wrong.

What she found was his blue robe, barely covering his chest, the cloth blackened and scorched.

She bit down a curse.

This…was too much.

Attacking an old, defenceless man? How had he sunk so low? So _cowardly?_

_Evil Puss…you are going to pay for this._

“Puss…” Artephius grumbled under his breath, “stay down…there’s a second prophecy…you can’t…just…let him…urgh…”

…What.

 _“What?”_ she demanded. But then Artephius was already beginning to nod off.

_“Artephius!”_

Startled awake and shooting up from his slump against the wall, he blurted: “Wha—who—whaa! There’s a second prophecy and it’s on page 465!”

“A _what?_ What are you talking about, Artephius?”

The half-senile alchemist blearily blinked his eyes at her. “Dulcinea? When did you get here?”

“Artephius…” She grabbed hold of both his shoulders and looked at him in the eye. “What’s this about a second prophecy?”

“It’s…oh boy.” He looked uncomfortable under her gaze, but she remained unrelenting in her pursuit for answers.

Having lived her entire life in a town riddled with mysticism and founded upon magic and lore, she’d learned long ago that any tiny thing even remotely related to the unseen beyond could be a key factor in unravelling everything.

A second prophecy might as well change the grim landscape of San Lorenzo’s fate.

“Artephius, please,” she begged when he still did not budge. “Tell me.”

“It’s…” He sighed, slumped back, and thumped his head against the wall, his entire body going slack again even as he continued to massage a dull throb on his chest. “It’s actually a very ancient prophecy from Zephilim literature. You know, the purple, one-eyed muscled female guards of the Netherworld?”

“Artephius!”

“Alright, alright,” he grumped, but he did not move to get up. He gestured at his workdesk. “See there? That’s the book where I found it written. Just—ow…”

He didn’t need to speak any more words. Dulcinea had already hopped up onto the workdesk and indeed, found a huge book, already opened in the middle. She flipped a few pages back, coughing as the dust rose.

She found the page.

_Darkness on San Lorenzo looms_

_beware of him who brings your doom._

_Though the Great Prophecy had risen against,_

_its One is merely a meek defence._

_So the_ Ancient _Prophecy thus foretells:_

_only the Chosen’s undoing shall undo the hell._

She…

She sat there, dumfounded.

“’Beware of him who brings your doom,’” said Artephius, noticing Dulcinea’s lack of reaction. “That one’s obviously Evil Puss. And the One from the Great Prophecy…that’s you, if I remember right?” He groaned as he got himself up in a proper sitting position against the wall, one hand still gripping his chest. “But the Chosen One of the _Ancient_ Prophecy…”

Dulcinea sat there, her mind drawing nothing but a blank.

Because she already knew the answer.

_Only the Chosen’s undoing shall undo this hell._

“Artephius…” and she didn’t care, did not _care_ , that her words trembled as she was clawing at the mahogany tabletop again.

“Puss came to you. Didn’t he?”

“Who did what come when?”

“ _Artephius—_ ”

“Ahhhh, yeah!” Eyes lighting up in memory, the mage finally lifted his hand from his chest so he could snap his bony fingers in the air. “I remember now! He wanted me to do something very weird…a chalk that could send him back to the past, he said!”

“You…” She. did. _not_. like this. “You gave him a chalk. That would send him…send him back in time _._ ”

_Only the Chosen’s undoing shall…_

“Uh…I think so?”

_Only the Chosen’s undoing._

_Undoing._

 “Where is he,” she hissed, angry not at herself, not at Artephius, not at Evil Puss.

She’s angry at Puss.

_Undoing._

That absolute idiotic _idiot_.

“Well, Evil Puss said something about a crater—“

Crater. The mountain.

She jumped off of the workdesk and landed nimbly on the floor. She took one look at the rose.

Then picked it up.

“I have to go.”

“Esmeralda, wait just a second,” Artephius groaned, trying to get up, but Dulcinea was already on her way. “I think there’s something wrong about the time manipulation spell I brewed, I— _argh—_ Dulcinea, WAIT! Ow—” He probably hit himself with the broom again, because he slumped back onto the floor, immediately asleep and muttering about tea brewed from the coloured lights of the rainbow.

But Dulcinea, she didn’t look back. Because she did not hear him. She couldn’t.

Not when she could hear her blood roaring in her ears.

_That’s right, Dulcinea…come._

This time, this time she was certain that that whispering voice in her ear was not a figment of her imagination.

_Your broken knight…he awaits his princess._

So she ran.

 _Puss,_ she thought. _Puss._

She ran, not caring about the certain fact that what she was about to fall into was a trap long laid by fate itself.

_You idiot._

She didn’t feel the hot tears as they streamed down her face.

_You are such an idiot._

 


End file.
